NASA recently announced that bad weather will force a 24-hour delay of the Phoenix Mars Lander launch, which was originally scheduled to launch Friday morning.  Weather reports indicate "severe weather" in the location of Florida's Kennedy Space Center launch pad.  

Unfavorable conditions also forced engineers to delay fueling the second stage of the United Launch Alliance Delta 2 rocket - the transport for the Phoenix - from yesterday to sometime today.

The launch is now scheduled to take place on Saturday, August 4 at 5:26 a.m. EST, with one scheduled fall back time of 6:02 a.m. EST.  Weather forecasts show an 85 percent chance of acceptable weather during the two launch periods.  The mission is such a high priority that NASA is willing to delay the launch of shuttle Atlantis in case Phoenix doesn't launch over the weekend.

NASA expects Phoenix to travel more than 420 million miles to Mars by May 2008 - the ultimate goal of the mission is to take soil samples with the hope of discovering signs of water and life.  While the NASA rovers Spirit and Opportunity were designed to freely travel along the Martian surface while conducting research, Phoenix will remain in one location.