BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Countdown to shuttle return flight
And it’s about time. High time we got back into the space business and dealt with the challenges rather than just analyzing and memorializing them. We’ve been relying on the Russians to keep the International Space Station supplied, crewed, and (more or less) repaired and it’s time we got back in the game.
There’s an air of real purpose, a desire to convince visitors like me that technical problems have been overcome, that the can-do spirit that caught the public imagination back in the Sixties to the moon is alive again.
The truth is that Nasa desperately needs this next mission to work. Only the shuttle has the capacity to carry into orbit the building-blocks for the International Space Station (ISS) and there’s an eagerness to get that task over and done.
A new repair kit will be able to patch damage on the shuttle exterior
That would clear the decks for the more glamorous roles of heading beyond orbit to the Moon and on to Mars.
The viewing stands are ready. The broadcasting cabins of the television networks, installed for the moon shots, are poised.
I meet the man who, on that fast-approaching May morning, will utter those famous words, “give me a go or no-go for launch”.
Mike Leinbach seems focused but calm. So will he be nervous? Sure, he says.
He won’t be alone.
I’m a Space Age kid and it grieves me to think of the losses, but it inspires me to think of the gains. So I wish NASA all success and I wish the Return To Flight crew of STS-114 Godspeed aboard Discovery. Their mission patch design commemorates Columbia and the efforts of everyone involved in making the Return To Space possible.
The NASA website currently starts with a very nice musical/Flash tribute to three tragic missions: Apollo I, Challenger, and Columbia.
