April 10, 2010
16:31:43z
UNISYS Visual Southeast USA Satellite
Hm. A lot happens in twelve hours.
April 4, 2010
15:30:13z
UNISYS Water Vapor GOES East Satellite (click here for 12 hour loop)
April 4, 2010
03:30:15 z
UNISYS Water Vapor GOES East Satellite
NASA astronauts are readying for the launch (click title to entry - thank you) of shuttle Discovery on Monday to deliver supplies and science experiments to the International Space Station. It is one of the final four missions planned for the shuttle fleet.
NASA officials say the three-day launch countdown began Friday for the launch of Discovery and its crew of seven astronauts.
Shuttle weather officer Kathy Winters says weather conditions should be good for the launch early Monday. She says the launch will occur shortly before the sun rises and casts sunlight on the rising shuttle and the smoke plume....
...The Discovery astronauts (click here) also plan to deliver spare parts for the station's water recycling system in an ongoing effort to work the bugs out of the complex life support equipment before the shuttle's retirement later this year.
"We didn't really know how to design this hardware at the beginning," said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's chief of space operations. "We did as good as we could and now we're actually working those bugs out. This is important for us to have the shuttle around for these couple of flights so we can get the water systems and the life support systems up and operating."
Mission managers cleared Discovery for launch after deciding a failed helium isolation valve in the ship's right-side aft rocket pod posed no significant threat to crew safety or meeting the flight's objectives. Likewise, a review showed suspect ceramic inserts around critical bolts were unlikely to shake free and pose an impact threat during launch or re-entry.
With Discovery ready to go, spacewalker Clay Anderson, veteran of a long-duration stay aboard the station in 2007, said the crew was anxious to get on with a complex mission....
...The odds are astronomical (click here), said Tom Petersen — and the Hudson’s Bay teacher wasn’t going for an easy pun.
Petersen knows two of the astronauts who will be aboard the space shuttle Discovery when it blasts off from the Kennedy Space Center early Monday morning.
Petersen taught with Dottie Metcalf-Lindenburger during her five-year tenure at Hudson’s Bay High School, and they also coached cross country and track together....
...But Metcalf-Lindenburger is not his only link to the NASA shuttle mission. Petersen went to a small college in Nebraska with Clay Anderson, who will be making his second trip to the International Space Station.
“We both graduated from Hastings College in 1981,” Petersen said.
Petersen and Anderson shared the college’s “Bronco Award,” given annually to outstanding seniors. Petersen said he got his share of the award through campus involvement — “ASB-type things.” Anderson was a multisport athlete....
