Shuttle Discovery Docks With Space Station 77
Velcroman1 writes "The space shuttle Discovery has docked with the International Space Station for the final time at 2:15 p.m. EST, where it will make a last delivery to the orbiting space lab — before parking ultimately at a museum. With Discovery's presence, the ISS becomes a truly 'international' space station. This is the first time spacecraft from the United States, Russia, Europe and Japan have all docked simultaneously, NASA said. The station also hosts the Leonardo Multipurpose Module built by the Italian Space Agency and recently gained Dextre, the Canadian Space Agency's robotic handyman."
Wasn't tetter source than Fox? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html
Re:Why not leave shuttle up there? (Score:2, Informative)
A) The Space Station already has an Arm, one far more flexible than the Space Shuttles
B) What is the point of a cargo bay if you have nothing to put in there (or take out after the current manifest is removed) and nowhere for it to go once that nonexistant cargo is removed
C) The Space Station has about as much pressurized quarters as a 747 right now, so what exactly is the small compartment on the shuttle going to do to improve that?
In addition, the equipment on the shuttle is not designed to remain in orbit for long periods of time, as well wings don't do much in orbit.
Re:Why not leave shuttle up there? (Score:5, Informative)
It's been mentioned before it's not perfectly pressurized and can't remain in space indefinitely. Even if it was perfectly pressurized it'd still need to get supplies from somewhere. So it would become useless pretty fast.
Also, the ISS is in an unstable orbit and must be re-boosted periodically. The shuttle would need to do the same as well, or eventually decay and burn up in the atmosphere.
I think ending up in a museum is a much better fate than that of Columbia.
Re:Last time "insert activity here". (Score:4, Informative)
btw, could someone tell us a bit about the other spacecrafts docking at the ISS
Here you go:
http://markosun.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/space-traffic-jam-up-at-international-space-station-iss/ [wordpress.com]
From TFA:
With all this action the following spacecraft will all be docked at the ISS at the same time: the Space Shuttle Discovery, The European Space Agency Kepler ATV, Russian Progress supply vehicle, Russian Soyuz-TMA capsule and Japan H-II Transfer Vehicle.