Space Shuttle Discovery Landed, Never to Fly Again
Originally published at A Singularity. You can comment here or there.
Just a few minuets ago, on March 9th, 2011 11:57am ET, NASA space shuttle Discovery landed for the final time, completing a twenty-seven year rotation of thirty-nine missions. It spent a cumulative three hundred and sixty-five days in space and it will soon be decommissioned and housed in the Smithsonian Institution.
Space shuttle Discovery touches down at the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday, March 9, to end the STS-133 mission. Photo credit: NASA TV
The Discovery will be the first of three shuttles decommissioned. The final two missions by Endeavor and Atlantis will finish by late June of this year, and the era of the NASA space shuttle will end.
There is a lot to say about America’s space program; the hardship they have endured for the last few decades. There is plenty to speculate about the loss of its funding and financing, the lack of public support for their projects, and its uncertain future
But now is not the time to discuss that. Now is the time to understand, reflect, and marvel at the effort and work that was put into the space shuttle program as it takes its final steps. To remember that wonder you felt the first time you saw a picture, video, or perhaps even saw a shuttle with your own eyes, knowing that that piece of machinery was a stepping stone for humanity to reach beyond our little planet.
Thank you Discovery, Endeavor, Atlantis, the entire fleet, and people who piloted, maintained, rode, and oversaw their operation. Thank you for being apart of some of the best of humanity’s history.
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