Space mission on course despite astronaut's arrest

The arrest of an astronaut on an attempted murder charge has not distracted the crew of an upcoming space shuttle mission, even though she had been scheduled to be part of the flight’s ground team, the shuttle’s commander said.

“I’m quite confident there will be no impact to our mission,” commander Rick Sturckow said at a news conference in Houston yesterday. “We’ve just been focused on our training, which is pretty intensive at this point.”