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Space shuttle dodges mysterious space junk

September 10, 2009
Associated Press

NASA has moved the shuttle Discovery out of the way of a mystery piece of orbiting junk and is hoping for a scheduled landing on Earth.

The astronauts fired shuttle thrusters around noon Thursday to avoid what Mission Control is calling a mystery object.

Officials say the debris apparently came off the linked shuttle and international space station during a spacewalk Saturday. Experts do not know what the piece is.

The shuttle is scheduled to land Thursday evening in Florida but thunderstorms could keep it in orbit an extra day or two.

If Discovery skips Florida on Thursday, NASA will consider the backup touchdown site in California as early as Friday.

Discovery delivered supplies and spent more than a week at the space station.



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Okay....."Officials say the debris apparently came off the linked shuttle and international space station during a spacewalk Saturday. Experts do not know what the piece is."


What if the piece is actually important for something like uh...landing?

nedfumpkin wrote:What if the piece is actually important for something like uh...landing?

I guess they'll find out come landing time.

nedfumpkin wrote: to avoid what Mission Control is calling a mystery object.

don't you hate it when scientists get all technical...

nedfumpkin wrote: What if the piece is actually important for something like uh...landing?

Then they'll be spending a lot more time on the space station...

Space is big and dark. Besides the shuttle and space station have thousands of parts. Do you really expect them be able to ID all of them quickly?

Or maybe some expensive top secret equipment just floated off into the abyss... Boy, I'd hat to be the person who let it go.

That space junk won't hurt anything... all it is is cotton and wool. It's my missing left sock! I got lots of missing socks, I figure they gotta be somewhere. Geosynchronous orbit makes sense, don't it?

WPandP wrote:That space junk won't hurt anything... all it is is cotton and wool. It's my missing left sock! I got lots of missing socks, I figure they gotta be somewhere. Geosynchronous orbit makes sense, don't it?

Styrofoam was the cause of the last shuttle disaster. Just think what cotton could do....