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One REALLY Long Runway for Rent

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the freefall-is-good-unless-it's-your-budget dept.

DarkNemesis618 writes "NASA is looking into putting its 15,000 foot runway up for rent at the Kennedy Space Center. The runway, which is used for Space Shuttle landings, will soon be used less and less as the Shuttle fleet is set to be retired in 2010. The first private venture was seen last month when Steve Fossett took off at KSC in Virgin Atlantic's experimental plane. One promising deal in the works comes from Zero Gravity Corp. which offers customers a few seconds of weightlessness on a Boeing 727-200. The shuttle runway, built in the 1970s never got the use it was expected to, and with the next generation of space vehicles using parachutes to land, the runway is going to have even less use."

8 of 211 comments (clear)

  1. Sell it piecemeal. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    They should smash it and auction off the pieces. It'd probably pay for itself.

  2. Oh yes! by plopez · · Score: 5, Funny

    Who's up for getting a '75 Chevy Nova and some RATO packs!

    --
    putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
  3. Re:Runway Lengths by epgandalf · · Score: 4, Funny

    Area 51 also has a really long runway. You can check it out on Google Maps or wikipedia. If you need a long runway, I'm sure the military wouldn't mind letting you use it.

  4. Maybe I could Land on that by QBasicer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Maybe with a runway that size I could actually land on it. Heck, all runways should be that long, so that planes won't "overshoot" the runway like you see in the news.

    --
    x86, oh yes, I'm pro.
  5. World's largest by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    hopscotch tournament?

    I know you want to.

  6. Make it the official U.S. by ch-chuck · · Score: 3, Funny

    Alien landing strip.

    --
    try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
  7. Re:Runway Lengths by Thud457 · · Score: 3, Funny
    And alligators. Don't forget it's designed to shed alligators. That's very important down in the pest-ridden swamps of Florididia!


    True story:
    We went on one of the bus tours at KSC. The bus had the usual complement, about half foreign tourists. We'd been around to see all the derelict technological wonders of the Apollo program and were headed back to the main visitor's center. The tour driver pointed out an common American Alligator in a run-off ditch alongside the road and stopped so the out-of-towners could get a good look. Those Nikon-toting tourists just about tipped the bus over trying to get a look at the scaley nuisance.

    --

    the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

  8. I wonder... by jon.wolf · · Score: 4, Funny

    I wonder if the Mythbusters could afford to rent it for a month or so.

    I'm sure there's something cool that Adam & Jamie could test there.

    Something dangerous.