SpaceX delays Dragon launch

Because of bad weather, private U.S. firm SpaceX on Monday called off its scheduled sixth cargo mission to the International Space Station as well as a second attempt to land the spent first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket on a ship in the Atlantic Ocean.

The California-based company's Dragon cargo ship, filled with more than 4,300 pounds (about 1,950 kg) of supplies and payloads, was slated to lift off at 4:33 p.m. EDT 2033 GMT Monday aboard the Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Mission control gave a "no-go" order minutes before the launch.

"Launch postponed due to lightning from an approaching anvil cloud," SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted.

The next launch opportunity is Tuesday at 4:10 p.m. EDT (2010 GMT), but U.S. space agency NASA said the weather outlook is slightly worse than Monday, with forecasters predicting a 50 percent chance of acceptable conditions.

The mission is SpaceX's sixth of the 12 cargo delivery flights under a contract of 1.6 billion U.S. dollars with NASA.

After liftoff, SpaceX will try to land the rocket's first stage on the company's autonomous spaceport drone ship, now named Just Read the Instructions, as part of a reusable-rocket test.

SpaceX first attempted to make the launch in January, but only ended with a crash on the boat because the rocket's steering fins ran out of hydraulic fluid.