THE HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT BLOG: From the Space Shuttle to Beyond

GEARING UP FOR FEBRUARY... Yesterday afternoon, the space shuttle Discovery was rolled over to the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Over the next week or so, Discovery will be mated to its external fuel tank and twin solid rocket boosters in preparation for its launch (on mission STS-119) to the International Space Station on February 12.


NASA / Jim Grossmann

This time around, what makes preparations for NASA’s first space shuttle flight of 2009 significant to me is that I’ll hopefully be in Florida from February 7-10. Ya’ll are probably asking, why not just stay an extra two days to see Discovery actually lift off in person? I’ll elaborate on that in future journal entries (but the main reason why I’m not gonna stay in Florida longer is because of money. Staying at a place for 4 days and not 6 or even 7 days obviously makes a huge difference, spending-wise. And I don’t exactly have a high-paying job right now, haha).


NASA / Kim Shiflett

Once mated with its fuel tank and boosters, Discovery will roll over to its launch pad, 39-A, on January 14. Speaking of the other pad, 39-B, construction continues to take place on the three huge lightning towers that will protect the Ares I rocket (shown below... Ares I will launch from 39-B) once it (hopefully) becomes operational around 2015. As you can see from the pic above, one of the towers have already been completed. Yet another thing to look forward to seeing in person exactly a month from now.



NASA