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Shuttle Makes Rare Night Landing

goG writes "After over 200 orbits around the Earth, space shuttle Endeavour landed safely in Florida on Sunday, ending a 14-day mission to the International Space Station. NASA pressed ahead with the Sunday night landing even though poor weather on both coasts threatened any touchdown attempt. Unusually, rain clouds were expected at both Edwards Air Force base in California and the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The return marked just the 23rd time the space shuttle has landed at night, out of 130 flights."

7 of 57 comments (clear)

  1. Scared the piss out of me, too. by geminidomino · · Score: 4, Funny

    Apparently it came in from West to East, because the boom made me jump out of my chair and scared my poor cats witless.

    They should warn a guy. :)

    1. Re:Scared the piss out of me, too. by cstdenis · · Score: 3, Funny

      They should warn a guy. :)

      They did. Unfortunately, you were not that guy.

      --
      1984 was not supposed to be an instruction manual.
  2. tap lava pools? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    nice clean steam/heat vents everywhere (much cleaner than the increasing random eruptions). we'd be back to having an atmosphere before we realize ours is kaput? no money in it? may as well blow up then.

  3. could it be? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    part of the 'newclear' power those freaks have been ranting about for all these years?

    some of us would do almost anything to make them stop/delete themselves, no?

    gnu online dating; sheesh

  4. Re:So...about one in five? by AP31R0N · · Score: 5, Funny

    Yup, it's awfully rare. 1 in 6 would be horribly rare. *Terribly* rare is 1 in 7.

    Negative rarity scale:
    4 - Icky
    5 - Awful
    6 - Horrible
    7 - Terrible
    8 - Disgusting

    --
    Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
  5. Re:So...about one in five? by quenda · · Score: 2, Funny

    The actual ratio depends on whether you are counting flights, or just landings.

  6. Re:Enjoy 'em while you can, folks by Usually+Unlucky+ · · Score: 2, Funny

    Not only has the Ares 1 already had it first test flight. I am here saying, on record, that the Dragon will not fly until at least 2020, if ever.

    SpaceX is a joke of a company.

    Do you know how simple the falcon 1 is? And they only have a 2/5 record with it. While most modern rocket systems, which have far greater abilities, designed in the last 20 years have perfect records.

    The Flacon 9 is much more complex, SpaceX will take a decade to get it right.

    Asking SpaceX to get a man to LEO is like asking the Wright Brothers to fly you across the Atlantic.

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