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Perimeter Railway for ISS; HETE-1 Comes Down

Posted by michael on from the they-think-they-can dept.

Quirk writes "The Sydney Morning Herald is touting the mission to start construction of an orbiting railway. Space Shuttle Atlantis will carry the astronauts who will initiate the planned 107 meter rail line along the outside of the International Space Station. The remote controlled train will move at speeds of 2.5 centimeters a second and be able to carry more than 20 tonnes of cargo. Construction is projected for completion in 2004." And B3avis followed up with news about the HETE re-entry: "The pieces of the HETE-1 spacecraft seem to have crashed somewhere in the Himalayas. "The final notification from Space Command indicates that the debris re-entered at 31.5 degrees North and 92.4 degrees East." says NASA. And they should know."

4 of 166 comments (clear)

  1. In other news... by Rhinobird · · Score: 4, Funny

    The crushed remains of the legendary beast 'Yeti' were found today, near a recent crater of unspecified origin...

    --
    If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
  2. hmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Interesting similarity, IIS and ISS both carry a huge load and move very, very slowly.

  3. $A357 million by Stackster · · Score: 5, Funny

    "Although the $A357 million train..."

    Is that "A" a typo, or are the numbers in hexadecimal to make it look cheaper?

    --

    There are 010 kinds of people. Those who understand octal, those who don't, and 06 other kinds of morons.
  4. Train? Don't let the British build it! by mccalli · · Score: 4, Funny
    As a train-travelling Britain myself, I can just imagine the announcement:

    "NASA Spacetrains (UK) regret to announce the late departure of the 17:48 'Dark Side of the Station' service. This is due to the wrong kind of sub-atomic particles bombarding the track. We apologise for any inconvenience caused."

    "NASA Spacetrains (UK) regret to announce the cancellation of the 17:53 'Earthside' service. This is due to a shortage of rolling stock. We apologise for any inconvenience caused."

    "NASA Spacetrains (UK) regret to announce that all anti-clockwise trains are running approximately three hours late. This is due to overrunning engineering works and signalling problems near Mars. We apologise for any inconvenience caused."

    etc...

    (Probably have to have experienced UK trains to find any of that funny. If you have experienced UK trains though, then you have my deepest sympathies.)

    Cheers,
    Ian