Safe Shuttle Landing This Morning

[Groesbeck Hurricane]

I listened to NPR live coverage of the shuttle landing on the way to work this morning. Sounds like it all went off without a hitch, short of having to land at Edwards in CA instead of Florida. Congratulations on a job well done!

[widebody911]

Been a good week; first the sub rescue and now the shuttle.

[djmcmath]

I just saw that piece of news, and breathed a sigh of relief. What a crazy job ...

[wludavid]

Did anyone else see the CNN video coverage? It didn't look like the image was taken with visible light. Maybe an infrared or night vision camera?

[IROC]

It was infrared (at least the far off shots)...

Mike

[on-ramp]

i dont get it. go into space, orbit the earth a few times, fix a few items that are broken, comment about how the earth is polluted, and then come back down. ha ha.

moral of the story: it's always a lot easier to fix $hit on the ground.

[wludavid]

You're right that this wasn't an ambitious mission from a science standpoint. We delivered supplies to the ISS, brought back some trash, but more importantly we pioneered some safety techniques and protocols that will useful on all future spaceflights - shuttle or otherwise. There were more cameras pointed at the shuttle during takeoff than ever before to record any possible problems. Remember in January 2003 how few images there were of the foam hitting the shuttle? There were lots more this time. We figured out how to take good pictures of the underside of the beast while in orbit, and demonstrated that repairs in orbit are possible. All in all, I'd say it was good PR and some good practical research for future spaceflight.

[artplumber]

Except now it's grounded...again.

[IROC]

Originally posted by on-ramp
i dont get it. go into space, orbit the earth a few times, fix a few items that are broken, comment about how the earth is polluted, and then come back down. ha ha.

moral of the story: it's always a lot easier to fix $hit on the ground.

Yep, you're right...you don't get it.

[bryanthompson]

Weren't we supposed to get a space elevator sometime soon? What ever happened to that. I read about it in Wired, back when Wired didn't totally suck.

[legion]

I'm guessing that the foam had been damaging tiles for quite some time. Do we really know if the repairs done really made a difference?

[IROC]

Originally posted by legion
I'm guessing that the foam had been damaging tiles for quite some time. Do we really know if the repairs done really made a difference?

The tiles take a beating for sure. To date, all of the repairs (to the tiles) have been done on the ground.

As for fixing the foam problem on the ET, check out this photo of the external tank after separation (notice the large chunk of foam missing):

[on-ramp]

Originally posted by IROC
Yep, you're right...you don't get it.

thank you for responding to my statement, sir. I highly appreciate it.

[84porsche]

I am really glad the shuttle landed safely. Its funny that it takes a tragedy to get this kind of coverage of the shuttle. I was up about 3am this morning to watch the shuttle land. Actually, I got up early the past 2 days.

I think the success of our space exploration has been phenomenal so far and I hope that we continue to explore. I would rather have us expanding our horizons and learning new things and seeing new places than killing each other. If you haven't looked at the Hiroshima/Nagasaki pictures and then look where 50 years later takes us to space and new ventures. It amazing how far and vast the human mind is and can be.

[techweenie]

What a relief they're back safe.

I didn't mind being awakened by the double sonic boom this morning.

[artplumber]

Originally posted by 84porsche
...I think the success of our space exploration has been phenomenal so far ....

No doubt. The danger with the whole concept of the shuttle was the idea that space (for people) was going to become routine. Unfortunately, we've had that idea revised by the repeated tragedies. It will always be dangerous up there (even if Virgin starts low orbit flights).

As the old pilot (and others) axiom goes: "There are old pilots and bold pilots, but there are no old, bold pilots."

[wludavid]

Originally posted by artplumber
The danger with the whole concept of the shuttle was the idea that space (for people) was going to become routine. Unfortunately, we've had that idea revised by the repeated tragedies. It will always be dangerous up there (even if Virgin starts low orbit flights).

The problem is that we rarely match the excitement with the level of danger. This last mission was STS-114. How many specific missions/objectives can the average person name? I can name 5 off the top of my head and 2 are because of the tragedies associated with them. When every mission was pushing the boundaries, it was dangerous, glamorous, and exciting. Now it's just dangerous with a lot of unsexy (but probably useful in the long term) results. Should NASA try to makes space sexier? Or should we keep on gathering data in a more routine fashion? That's not a rhetorical question - it's one that needs to be answered.

Columbia's demise had a big impact on me. I was too young to understand what happened to the Challenger, and we'd had 15+ years of unparalleled success since then. I went to a party that night and saw lots of drunken people who didn't seem to give a damn what had happened to 7 people who I can't even name but still consider my heroes. They died doing what they loved; something I would die to do. And the only people I saw that day express any feelings about it were the newscasters. Needless to say, it was a little depressing for me.

[VaSteve]

Here is a fact I learned today at work. A 2 oz chunk of foam flying at whatever speed the shuttle takes off at inflicts 700-800 pounds of damage!!!