Atlantis home
Thursday, September 21st, 2006 Posted in Space | 1 Comment »Space Shuttle Atlantis has landed safely. *whew!* I’m getting more nervous about shuttle missions lately. In part, it’s the greater focus on all the things that could go wrong. In part, it’s the realization that you know, the shuttle fleet really is aging.
But mostly, I think it’s the fear that, given reactions to the Columbia disaster, our nation may be only one disaster away from writing off space—or at least humans in space—entirely.
Speaking of Atlantis, the Bad Astronomy posted a fantastic photo by Thierry Legault of the shuttle and the International Space Station passing in front of the sun!
Back in Space!
Tuesday, July 26th, 2005 Posted in Space | 2 Comments »NASA Returns to Flight as Discovery Reaches Orbit.
Rather than getting my hopes up, I’ve been taking an “I’ll believe it when I see it” approach to this. And now, we’re finally back in space!
Here’s hoping the shuttle will be able to tide us over until the next-generation ship is ready. IMO we should have had another type of launch vehicle five years ago at the latest. That way Columbia never would have gone up, or if it had, we could have kept the newer fleet flying and just grounded the shuttles.
On a more personal note, I’m reminded of the time I went to see a shuttle landing. My mom took me and my brother out of school for a day, and we drove up with a family friend to Edwards Air Force Base where we set up camp with a zillion other people on the dry lake bed. We slept in the car, and the next morning everyone tried to get as close as possible to the chain link fence that marked the edge of the public viewing area.
Somewhere in a closet, I’ve still got a roll of slides from that landing. Of course, they had us so far away from the runway that I could barely catch the shuttle with a telephoto lens. I made an 8×10 print of the best slide in my grandfather’s home photo lab, and the shuttle was barely 1½ inches.
And the shuttle that I watched land? It was Discovery, and it was the first flight since the Challenger disaster.
Now if someone can just convince NASA to give Hubble its 120-zillion mile checkup instead of just throwing it away…
