In Honor of The Last Flight - How the Space Shuttle Was Born

Discovery has now landed and we're moving on, but one last look at some of the most famous photos of the shuttle:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news ... lepictures
The Most Unforgettable Space Shuttle Pictures
Published July 20, 2011

When the space shuttle Atlantis lands on Thursday, it will wrap up STS-135, the final shuttle mission in the U.S. program's 30-year history. This shot is among those chosen by National Geographic photo editors as the most unforgettable pictures from the entire shuttle program.

Suspended above the planet, the space shuttle Endeavour is silhouetted against the layers of Earth's atmosphere in a picture taken by an ISS crew member on February 9, 2010.

This one needs no description...


Learn something new every day!

The space shuttle Columbia sits on a launch pad at Kennedy Space Center on March 5, 1981.

Following the first two launches, NASA calculated that they could safely shave 600 pounds (272 kilograms) from a shuttle's overall launch weight by not painting the large external fuel tank white and instead leaving its orange insulating foam exposed.

Being the geek that I am, this one, of course, is MY favorite!

Originally slated to bear the name Constitution, the first space shuttle to be built was dubbed Enterprise following a write-in campaign from Star Trek fans. Above, cast members from the science-fiction show attend the shuttle's rollout ceremony in Palmdale, California, on September 17, 1976.

Where we go from here:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/07/ ... c=fb&cc=fp
Spaceflight Is Getting Cheaper. But It's Still Not Cheap Enough.
by David Kestenbaum
July 21, 2011

Elon Musk wants humans to live on other planets one day. But he's worried about the cost of getting there. So in 2002, he took the fortune he made in Internet start-ups and started his own rocket company. He called it SpaceX.

The company is still in its early days. It's had seven launches, four of which made it into orbit. According to the company's website, the price to put stuff in orbit runs around $2,000 to $3,000 per pound.

Musk says SpaceX's latest rocket in development, the Falcon Heavy, will be able to do it for as little as $1,000 a pound.

Historically, that's pretty low. Using the Space Shuttle to get a pound of something to the Space Station, for example, costs around $10,000.

"Clearly that's still too much," Musk says. "We really need to get to well under $100 a pound."