Heightened post-9/11 security was in evidence as the seven-person team of astronauts, dressed in orange space jumpsuits, arrived around 7:15 am for the rehearsal.

"The exercise will enable the shuttle launch team and Discovery's crew to get familiar with all of the procedures they'll go through in the days and hours leading up to the real liftoff," said Bruce Buckingham, news chief for the Kennedy Space Center.

NASA announced last week it was delaying its resumption of shuttle flights by nearly two months, and that the new date for liftoff would be July 13.

On Wednesday, commander Eileen Collins told reporters that the risks associated with a May launch of the Discovery were "unacceptable."

NASA pushed back the Discovery's mission to the orbiting International Space Station to carry out a more exhaustive review of modifications the shuttle has undergone since the Columbia disintegrated on reentry on February 1, 2003, killing all seven astronauts on board.

earlier related report
Risks for May flight of Discovery were too high, says shuttle commander
Cape Canaveral, Florida (AFP) May 04, 2005 - The risks of launching the Discovery in May were "unacceptable," commander Eileen Collins told reporters a week after NASA delayed Discovery's launch for two months.

"We can't fly with anything that's an unacceptable risk," the commander and six other members of the Discovery crew told a news conference Tuesday near the launch pad where the Discovery awaits its mid-July liftoff -- it was originally scheduled to go up between May 15 and June 3.

NASA pushed back the Discovery's mission to the orbiting International Space Station to carry out a more exhaustive review of the modification the shuttle has undergone since the Columbia disintegrated on reentry on February 1, 2003, killing all seven asteonauts on board.

The US space agency had no other choice but to delay the Discovery flight, Collins said.

"I truly believe we've made the right decision in going to July," added the first woman commander of a space shuttle mission.

The Discovery crew was at Kennedy Space Center here to take part in a launch rehearsal on Wednesday. Afterward, they will return to the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, to continue training for their upcoming mission.

All rights reserved. � 2004 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.

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