OT: Discovery's Final Flight
As I'm sure many of you know, the Space Shuttle Discovery made its final voyage to the Smithsonian, and landed at Dulles International Airport this morning. I know there are a lot of fellow Wolverines in the DC metro area who were able to see its victory lap (it passed right by my office building twice!), but I thought I'd share with the mgocommunity how truly amazing it was to see a bunch of adults acting like children. The entire city, residents and tourists alike, froze and ran to rooftops to witness the orbiter riding piggyback on a 747 at 1500ft.
Obviously we're at an interesting point in terms of the shape of America's civilian space program in the future, but it was awesome to see the overwhelming enthusiasm and support that still exists for our continued exploration of outer space.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:02 PM ^
I work in NoVa not far from Dulles, near top of a tall building. We watched it circle around Dulles and the area, go back to DC, then come back. My reaction was: It looked like a HUGE bug, you don't see aircraft that are as thick as they are long. Of course it was 2 not 1, but visually that's sort of how it looked.
(In 1981, on a trip to see the Mouse in Orlando, I saw Columbia on the launch pad prior to its first mission. So I can say I have visually seen the start and the end of the program.)
Future of the program is fine. SpaceX, Boeing and Orbital are building the next generation craft. SpaceX's Dragon is going to dock with ISS in the next few weeks. Elon Musk designed Dragon not only to visit the ISS, but to land on "any hard surface in the solar system." The advanced Draco thrusters, to be used as an escape system in a launch abort, are strong enough to gently land Dragon on California soil -- or, someday, Mars's soil.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:03 PM ^
I was just on a conference call that included a bunch of federal agency reps and national associations. Every 3 minutes the call was interrupted by another person on the concall being like "omigod the space shuttle just flew by!"
April 17th, 2012 at 12:07 PM ^
Picture or it didn't happen . . .
April 17th, 2012 at 12:19 PM ^
The Washington Post has a pretty good gallery. Currently trending on twitter as #spottheshuttle
nice gallery - thanks - great sendoff and an awesome sight
Picture with Taylor Lewan riding on top of the shuttle or it didn't happen.
April 17th, 2012 at 11:20 PM ^
The DC airspace is the most heavily controlled airspace on the planet. I drive a C172 and I would never dare to fly anywhere near DC.
This was a highly organized flight. My guess is that it needed approval from POTUS as there were about a dozen violations committed by this pilot.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:11 PM ^
thats awesome! i wish i could have seen it. i hope one day our space program will come back to the fore front of our country.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:14 PM ^
Dayton invented flight, and Dayton can take it back...The Air Force Museum is also in Dayton.
I go to school at UDayton and I always tell people the only reason the Wright Brothers invented flight was so they could fly out of ohio and up to Michigan.
I absolutely hate the fact that all of the Shuttles are on the coasts. It would have been nice if they could have sent one of the shuttles to either Dayton or Chicago. I can understand one staying in Florida. I can kind of understand one being near LA. But why should there be two shuttles that are maybe 5 hours apart? Ah well...
April 17th, 2012 at 12:18 PM ^
Props for the "Space bitches" tag. Even if this story does not technically relate to Michigan.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:19 PM ^
... with F-16 escort:
http://www.princeofpetworth.com/2012/04/the-shuttle/
First pass I saw was from the south, came over the Anacostia River around 6th and N SE. Banked to the West, came back around from SW to SE along M St and continued out towards National Harbor, then came through one more time a little further north.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:41 PM ^
Not to nitpick, but I'm almost certain that's the T-38 trainer jet used by NASA.
I'm sure you're right.
April 17th, 2012 at 11:03 PM ^
NASA operates a fleet of 32 T-38 aircraft[5] and uses the aircraft as a jet trainer for its astronauts, as well as a chase plane. Its fleet is housed primarily at Ellington Field in Houston, Texas. NASA’s internal projections show the number of operational jet trainers falling to 16 by 2015. The agency spends between $25 million and $30 million annually to fly and maintain the T-38s.[6]
April 17th, 2012 at 12:20 PM ^
Get off my lawn, and out of my air space.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:27 PM ^
I have never seen Discovery up close, but I'm lucky enough to say that I got to be on the launch pad when Atlantis was on the launch pad for STS-135, the last space shuttle mission. I got within inches of Endeaveour (STS-134) while it was in the hanger very shortly after it had landed. I never got to see one launch, but just being that close to them is very inspiring, and though the technology was outdated and never lived up to what it originally had claimed it would, it was still an absolutely amazing aircraft.
It's hard to say where each of these should have ended up. A lot of places have good arguments for them. It's hard not to get into politics when discussing the space shuttle anymore, anyway, so I'll try to stay away from that end of things. All I know is that when I got to see those things it was truly inspiring, and the more people that can see these amazingly designed vehicles, the more people will hopefully want to be a part of whatever is next in our journies in space exploration.
Also, to any college students, take advantage of as many of the amazing opportunites out there as you can. Things like this don't just happen when you get into the real world (they sometimes do, but to a much lesser extent). I'm lucky enough to have had an internship that allowed me to travel the country and see some of the best Space companies in the world, and get paid to do it. Students: take advantage of these things if you can.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:39 PM ^
Just curious, did you happen to be part of the NASA Academy program? I was able to do this internship and it was an awesome experience.!
The NASA Academy was a great experience. I highly recommend it.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:33 PM ^
i dont know which is more amazing. the space shuttle or the plane that can pack a space shuttle on its back.
April 17th, 2012 at 12:37 PM ^
If you want to be simply amazed at something watch this 400 second video. A friend of mine who recently retired from NASA sent me this link to a film of a shuttle's booster rocket's journey from the launching pad, into space and then back to earth. It is truly breathtaking.
http://www.modelairplanenews.com/blog/2012/03/28/a-ride-to-space-back-video-from-a-booster-engine/
thanks for sharing thst video. im a bit of a space nut and love stuff like this. thanks again,that video is amazing!
Not as nerve-wracking as they could have made it; I was assuming they just stuck a camera pointing down, and that would have been eerie, IMO.
Thanks for the nice words guys. He sends me alot of cool videos like this one and I'll try to remember that in the off-season it's ok to post the real interesting ones.
You should see some of the Hubble shots he had access to. They were so amazing I thought they were faked.
I highly recommend the Hubble IMAX movie (the one narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio) to anyone who gets the chance to see it. It is almost surreal. The vastness of space that it captures is beyond description.
Worth every second of time to watch this! Thanks for sharing.
then looked out my window and there it was! Truly amazing, I had half the floor running towards my office. Turned an awful morning into a memorable one.
I have a friend that works for NASA and he sent me this today.
Speaking of strange things in the sky, listen to this: http://www.myfoxchicago.com/dpp/news/metro/military-blackhawks-circle-downtown-skies-honing-urban-battle-skills-chicago-20120416 Sure, extra security for NATO... who hates NATO? They report it so cheerily.