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anth
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# Posted: 4 Jul 2006 17:55
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Space Shuttle Discovery July 4th launch Success!
NASA officials lauded the July 4th launch of the space shuttle Discovery Tuesday but added that much work remains ahead, not the least of which are evaluations of several pieces of foam debris that popped loose from the orbiter's fuel tank.
A video camera mounted to Discovery's external tank caught at least three, possibly four, pieces of shuttle fuel tank foam falling away from its perch two minutes and 47 seconds into the launch, NASA space shuttle program manager Wayne Hale said.
"It could be an ice frost ramp, it could be something else," Hale said during a post-launch press briefing here at NASA's Kennedy Space Center (KSC), adding another piece of foam was also seen almost five minutes into launch. "Both of those are interesting because they are after the time we are concerned about aerodynamic transport doing damage to shuttle tile."
Shuttle officials have repeatedly said they expected to see some foam loss during Discovery's launch, and are awaiting their first report from image analysts poring through today's launch imagery. A press briefing on that report is expected to occur no earlier than 7:30 p.m. EDT (2330 GMT), NASA said.
"I would not count this as off nominal, this is kind of what we expected," said William Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for space operations. "I think we've got two awesome pieces of data here from an engineering standpoint."
Later comments between flight controllers and Discovery's astronaut crew indicated that the second foam piece may have struck the orbiter's mid-body between the nose landing gear and main landing gear doors.
Hale stressed that the timing at which the foam pieces fell from Discovery much later than when any large debris could damage the orbiter's heat shield. That timing ranges from about 60 seconds after liftoff on to about 135 seconds – or two minutes and 15 seconds – into the flight.
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christena
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# Posted: 4 Jul 2006 20:05
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And I must say..what a spectacular sight it was to see it. I only wish I could have been there in person. I do hope they have a safe mission and a safe return.
Cinna 
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demonvamp
Member
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# Posted: 5 Jul 2006 09:38
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Third time's the charm  Though it was a good reason for me to sit watching nasa tv all weekend.
QD
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lycanthrope
Member
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# Posted: 6 Jul 2006 16:38
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn....pf.html
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dlgrubbs
Member
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# Posted: 18 Jul 2006 13:32
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They are Back..:)
The Space Shuttle Discovery and its crew are home after a 13-day, five million-mile journey in space. The mission, STS-121, succeeded in testing shuttle safety improvements, repairing a rail car on the International Space Station and producing never-before-seen, high-resolution images of the shuttle during and after its July 4th launch.
President Bush welcomed the crew home, saying "your courage and commitment to excellence have inspired us all."
Crew Briefing
Less than six hours after bringing Discovery to a smooth touchdown at Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Landing Facility, STS-121 Commander Steve Lindsey explained to a crowd of media that it's good to be back on Earth after a successful mission. He was joined by his five crewmates: Pilot Mark Kelly and Mission Specialists Piers Sellers, Mike Fossum, Lisa Nowak and Stephanie Wilson.
"We had a long, but very successful mission," a smiling Lindsey said of the 13-day, 5.3-million-mile journey to the International Space Station. "This crew sitting before you were just about as perfect as you can be on a flight. As commander, it was a privilege to be on this crew and serve with them."
Lindsey explained that there were two major objectives for this mission. The first was to complete the return-to-flight objectives begun in July 2005 on the STS-114 mission. These included flying an improved external tank and testing on-orbit shuttle repair procedures. The second objective was to prepare the station for future assembly, and boost the number of people living on the station to three.
"We accomplished both," Lindsey said of these goals.
STS-121 Landing information
+ View the landing groundtracks
+ NASA's Landing Blog
+ Landing 101
Additional Resources
+ STS-121 Fact Sheet (552 Kb PDF)
+ STS-121 Press Kit (6 Mb PDF)
+ STS-121 Mission | + STS-121 Crew
+ STS-121 EVA 3 Timeline (1.8 Mb PDF)
+ Additional media resources
07.17.06 - STS-121 MCC Status Report #26
A smooth landing by the Space Shuttle Discovery at the Kennedy Space Center this morning completed the second return to flight test mission and set the stage to resume assembly of the International Space Station later this summer.
07.16.06 - STS-121 MCC Status Report #25
Discovery is targeted for a landing at 8:14 a.m. CDT Monday at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html
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