Husband: Giffords may attend his shuttle launch

The husband of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords said Thursday that she is starting to understand the magnitude of the Jan. 8 shooting that killed six and left the congresswoman with a gunshot wound through the brain.

"She's starting to process some of the tragedy," said astronaut Mark Kelly at a Houston briefing to discuss his April flight on space shuttle Endeavour. Even so, "she remains in a very good mood."

Kelly said Giffords is walking and talking more. She's improving so fast, Kelly said, that there's a "pretty good chance" that she will attend his launch, scheduled for April 19.

Kelly said he sees his wife, who's getting intensive therapy at a rehabilitation hospital in Houston, every day before and after his flight training at NASA's nearby Johnson Space Center. He said his preparations for the complex 14-day mission had not suffered from his wife's situation. Kelly is the commander of Endeavour's six-man crew, which will install a $2 billion physics experiment on the International Space Station.

"It's not difficult to focus," Kelly said. "I'm spending as much time ... focused on the mission as if this never even happened to my wife."

Kelly acknowledged that the training would have been much more challenging had this been his first shuttle flight, or his first flight as commander. This will be his fourth shuttle flight and his second in command, which "makes it very manageable to be able to handle what's going on in my personal life," he said.

Kelly said his wife was "really happy" to get a visit last week from her brother-in-law and his identical twin Scott Kelly. Scott Kelly returned to Earth on March 16 after a five-month stint aboard the space station.

Gabrielle Giffords U.S. Congresswoman, D-Ariz. Office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords

Mark Kelly took a leave of absence to be at his wife's bedside, and for some weeks his crew wasn't sure he would return.

At that point Kelly's crew had trained together for a year and a half, and "the teamwork was so tight," said Endeavour astronaut Greg Chamitoff. "We're really happy that he was able to continue the mission with us."

The mission is Endeavour's last and the second-to-last in the shuttle program. After Atlantis visits the space station in June, all three surviving shuttles will retire to museums.

At the briefing, Kelly and his crewmates wore turquoise bracelets stamped with a heart and the word "Gabby."

Shuttle crewmembers grow close to each other's families, said Kelly's crewmate Greg Johnson. "By wearing the bracelets, we're just acknowledging our support for Gabby," he said. "She's part of our family."