Weather Scrubs Shuttle Launch

The launch of the shuttle Atlantis today on a cloak-and-dagger mission to put a high-priority spy satellite in orbit was postponed until Friday because of dangerous scissor-like winds, NASA said.

Atlantis, thought to be carrying a $500-million radar spy satellite in its cargo bay, had been scheduled to lift off on the 27th shuttle mission, the second since the Challenger disaster, at 6:59 a.m. EST today after a secret countdown, sources said. But a frontal system swept over the Kennedy Space Center shortly before dawn, bringing cloud cover and showers to the shuttleport and, eventually, unacceptable high-altitude winds.