KSC-2011-7931

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – At NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida, media representatives tour the Launch Control Center's Firing Room 1. They are taking the 21st Century Ground Systems tour which also includes the Vehicle Assembly Building, a crawler-transporter parked on the crawlerway, and the new mobile launcher on Launch Pad 39B. These facilities and equipment will be used to prepare and launch NASA's new Orion spacecraft on the Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket. The tour was arranged as part of prelaunch media activities for the agency's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) launch. Liftoff of MSL aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex-41 on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station is planned during a launch window which extends from 10:02 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. EST on Nov. 26. For more information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/msl. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann