Shuttle Atlantis heads for California touchdown

By Irene Klotz

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - NASA on Sunday gave up waiting for weather to clear for U.S. space shuttle Atlantis to land in Florida, diverting it to California after a 13-day mission to refurbish the Hubble Space Telescope.

Flying over Africa, Atlantis commander Scott Altman and pilot Greg Johnson fired their spaceship's twin braking rockets to leave orbit and begin an hour-long glide to Edwards Air Force Base in California's Mojave Desert.

Touchdown is scheduled for 11:39 EDT (1539 GMT).

NASA had planned to bring Atlantis back to its home in Florida on Friday but was stymied by cloudy skies and rain over the Kennedy Space Center.

The U.S. space agency prefers to land at the Florida launch site to save the time, money and risk of ferrying the shuttle cross-country atop a 747 jet carrier.

Flight directors tried again to land Atlantis in Florida on Sunday but were concerned that offshore rain would drift to within 30 nautical miles of the runway at the time of the shuttle's landing.

Flight directors took another look at the weather as Atlantis circled the planet one more time before diverting to California.

"The Edwards weather is great, it's clear," astronaut Greg Johnson from Mission Control in Houston radioed to the crew.