Friday the 13th - space shuttle
 

I have to be at a meeting tomorrow morning at 6 am (Saturday) in preparation for the shuttle landing, then stick around until after the thing's on the ground (in other words, I gotta work).

I was discussing this with a fellow mission manager yesterday and we were both pondering why this flight is landing tomorrow instead of today. We always land roughly 48 hours after undocking from the station. We undocked Wednesday morning.

This is a scheduled 14 day flight. Saturday is flight day 15.

Is NASA superstitious? I'm gonna have to ask this question at the morning meeting. I'll let ya know.

Tom

Interesting. Look forward to seeing what you may find out :cool:.

WE actually had this discussion at home too, Tom.

The feeling here was if they are covering EVERY base, they best be covering that one too!

What an amazing undocking from the ISS that was Wednesday a.m.!! I love how they ring the ships' bells when they depart.

I watched it for HOURS when I got home from work in the morning. The circular flyover was beautiful, showing the size and configuration of the ISS now.

The view from the station was awesome too, watching Discovery get smaller and smaller as she moved away to get into position to leave.

Barring any unforseen circumstance, isn't this her last flight? She's been a shining example of what's right about the whole space program.

We'll be watching the landing!

Thanks for working so hard for the program and for taking time to update us, Tom. YOU ROCK!

Of course when I was a child I believed in such things but as an adult I never put any merit into mysicism, however many people do carry superstition over into there adulthood and I would be suprised if that was the reasion NASA desided to keep them up there an extra day!

Don
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Interesting question, Tom! You have to wonder if the main PR office wasn't slammed with paranoid emails. Do tell when you get word!

i got my divorced finalized on friday the 13th many moons ago, 13 has been my lucky number for years,

imagine part of their decision, was, well what if something happened the whole country would be like its the 13th it was jinxed,

look at apollo 13,

whatever they decide hopefully they will have a safe landing, sorry if i jumped track

Tom,

Didn't you get the memo?:confused:

They delayed one day so that the shuttle crew could watch the dismantling of the Lakers by the Celtics.:eek:

The memo was added to page 4 of the OPS Guide for the mission...:)

-Vic

Watching NASA TV now for the landing. De-orbit burn is expected at 10:10 a.m. EDT. Weather in FL looks good for them to come into Kennedy Space Center.

It was noted after the shuttle left the ISS that there was something following them. It has been decided that it was a clip from the rudder?

They said it wouldn't affect the landing, but now I HAVE to watch them come in. It's time to pray and hold your breath again, folks, at least in my house!! Fingers and toes are crossed here!

(i'm delaying my shopping for this!!)

watching nasa tv station now about 57 mints to land

weegot5kidz, Thankyou, I didn't really think to turn on NASA station & you told me about what time. http://bestsmileys.com/thumbs/7.gif

Lorraine

getting ready for the sonic booms here:eek:

praying for a safe landing

we watch the launches from our back yard :) always spectacular but this last one was especially so !

welcome back to terra firma

A nice clean landing..:)

Thanks, Tom..:cool:

Friday the 13th superstition? At my job one semi-truck came off the scales and high centered on a concrete block, another took out a fence. Guess I'm just happy they didn't take out the scalehouse where I'm working :)

So Tom, what's the answer?

The official position is that being Friday the 13th had nothing to do with the extra 24 hours after un-docking.

I'll never know for sure. The general consensus here is that NASA avoids the number 13 like the plague - ever since Apollo 13.

This mission set a record for fewest anomalies during mission. I'm glad it happened on my watch, though I'm only a small player.

Tom