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Shuttle May Fly Again In '04
giantsfan89 writes "A report from CNN says that a shuttle (possibly Atlantis) could fly again next fall. "The latest launch window is September 12 to October 10, NASA said Friday." A conference call referenced in the NY Times (free reg or via Google News) says it'll be an uphill battle (obviously) but that 'I'll also guarantee you that we're getting an awful lot smarter about this and we're going to come back stronger and safer as a result.'"
NASA administration officials have determined that rocket fuel is "dumber and unsafer" and discontinued its use throughout the organization. When questioned about the decision, part of NASA's "smarter and safer" initiative, Patalie Nortman of NASA's alternative propulsion division had this to say:
"It was simply a matter of investing our money, well, YOUR money actually, in the right place. We opted for a launch system comprised of thousands of high strength polymer rubber bands to effectively 'sling' the shuttle into space. It was incredibly easy and inexpensive to implement. The real cost shifted to our computerized targeting system capable of aiming the shuttle into the proper orbital launch trajectory. Microsoft software was chosen for this critical system because system failure was simply not an option."
Further discussion was cut short as the final seconds of the launch arrived.
T MINUS 5 SECONDS AND COUNTING...
4...
3...
STOP 0x000000D1 DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL (0x0,0x0,0x0,0x0)
Gah...!
Thwiiiiip!!!
wow... i so wish i was you...