NASA started fueling the space shuttle Atlantis's external fuel tank ahead of a possible launch despite concerns weather could cause a delay, a NASA spokesman said.

Weather forecasters at Cape Canaveral said there was a 70 percent chance of unfavorable weather conditions at the planned time of the launch, set for 1945 GMT. They were expecting clouds and rain.

But weather patterns can change quickly in Florida, and NASA was hoping for good enough weather at launch time, spokesman George Diller said.

"Except for the weather, there is no technical issue," Diller said.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration Wednesday also warned that if storms stall over central Florida, launch windows on Friday and Saturday could also be squelched.

The crew got up at 4:15 am (0915 GMT) for a final medical checkup. They were to don their orange flight suits and arrive at the launch site at 11:25 am (1625 GMT). The door is set to be closed at 12:40 pm (1740 GMT).

The mission is to deliver the 10-tonne European laboratory unit Columbus to the International Space Station, which is being developed as a jumping-off point for exploration to Mars and beyond.

With room inside for three people and operated by ground staff at a control center near Munich, Germany, Columbus will enable the European Space Agency to conduct experiments related to biotechnology, medicine, materials and liquids.

The lab cost some 1.3 billion euros (two billion dollars), paid mostly by Germany, Italy and France.

The main task for the mission is to use the ISS's robot arm to transfer Columbus out of Atlantis's payload bay and attach it to the space station.

Three spacewalks are scheduled during the mission, which is seen as a major step forward for European ambitions in space.

The Atlantis crew includes astronauts Leopold Eyharts of France and Hans Schlegel of Germany. Currently there are US and Russian astronauts at the space station.

Schlegel will conduct two spacewalks during the flight to connect power and fluid lines between Columbus and the ISS.

Eyharts will become Europe's second long-duration resident on the space station, replacing US astronaut Dan Tani. The German astronaut of ESA, Thomas Reiter, stayed six months in the station in 2006.

Atlantis was originally scheduled for blastoff on December 6 as part of the tight schedule of shuttle flights to complete the ISS construction by 2010, when the three-craft US shuttle fleet is to be retired.

But malfunctioning circuits in the fuel gauges of the spacecraft's liquid hydrogen tank forced a two-month delay.

Senior NASA official Bill Gerstenmayer has said engineers tracked down the cause of the recurrent problem and it has been fixed.

"Atlantis is ready to go fly," Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, assistant NASA test director, told reporters Monday, when the crew arrived at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida for the launch.

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