I had my empeg on, just happened to turn on the radio on a trip to hear what a station was playing, and it was a CNN feed. Sigh.

They lost it right as I was getting on the PA Turnpike, apparently.

It was supposed to fly over us in Louisiana at 8:03 am central. They said you may or may not be able to see it and you might hear a sonic boom. So I went out a couple minutes before, looking at the west and waited. When it didn't come, I thought to myself, and almost said to someone jokingly, "oh well it probably crashed." Then I turned on the news 2 hours later and HOLY [censored] [censored] IN A [censored] AND [censored] WITH [censored] [censored] [censored], [censored], [censored] KANGAROO [censored] ON A [censored] [censored]-[censored] [censored] IT DID [censored] CRASH.

In reply to:

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The eBay listing was for four Columbia disaster related domains like columbiacleanup.com, columbiadisaster.com and so on.

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Sick fsckers...

That's tame. I'm sure we'll get some sick people out there trying to auction off bits of debris.

- Trevor

sorry, but im not really sickened by either prospect. i would even entertain purchasing such debris.

And any auction or offer for selling debris will probably have the Feds knocking on their door real quick...

The asking price was $17,000. That's what got to me.

I hadn't really turned on the TV or anything today (I still haven't), when I drove by the local Boy Scouts building and saw their flags at half-mast. I just figured that Joe ``Fag-hater'' Scoutleader had died or something and scoffed at it. Of course, now I feel like shit. It's sad to see anyone go, but it's even worse when they're highly intelligent and skilled people making shit for money in highly dangerous jobs, and doing it all for selfless reasons, whether they be astronauts or firemen or whatever.

Godspeed.

I just hope this incident dosen't cause us to run back under our rocks and stop looking upward. The Challenger incident had devistating results on our path into space.

This time we can't sit on our thumbs and contemplate. We've got astronauts in the ISS, and they can't live up there forever. I'm sure that the Russians could bring them back down, but I don't think anyone in our current government is likely to let that happen. Maybe it should, though, to show that we can deal with the rest of the international community on a rational and compassionate (even to our benefit) level.

The ISS has a Russian Soyuz capsule up there already incase of emergency so they're safe.
You still need to have to sit down and try to work out what happened to Columbia before doing anything else though. It's too much of a risk that the rest of the shuttle fleet could have the same problem.

- Trevor

We've got astronauts in the ISS, and they can't live up there forever. I'm sure that the Russians could bring them back down, but I don't think anyone in our current government is likely to let that happen.

The Russian's don't actually need to send a ship up to get them (though they are launching an unmanned supply ship today anyway) as they always keep a Soyuz capsule docked with the ISS. That way it is always ready to be used as a lifeboat to get the crew home in an emergency.

I think the US will need to pump some more cash into the Russian space industry over the next year or so though, so that they can plug the gaps left by the lack of Shuttle missions to the ISS.

Will the ISS even continue?

They haven't decided on that yet. They have the option to mothball it for extended periods, as long as occasional maintenance visits are made. Apparently (according to CNN) they were considering doing this for part of this year anyway. CNN didn't explain why they were considering this though, perhaps they are waiting from another module from the Russians or something ?

I'm pretty sure that techically they could keep it running without the Shuttle (by paying the Russians extra), but adding new modules would be next to impossible I suspect.

I thought there were other shuttles 'lying around'. It seems odd that there would only be one shuttle built at a time.

There were initially seven built: one structural test rig (never left the ground nd was destroyed), one flight test airframe (Enterprise) and then the five service orbiters. Challenger was destroyed, and a replacement spaceframe was ordered to replace it.

Who knows if there can be a replacement this time. There should be: if Bush has any sense of proportion, then maybe he should think about not rushing into a war which no-one supports and re-direct his attention to the space program to ensure the livelihoods of engineers all over the US. This would ensure our future, not a bloody oil war!!!

Is that right? I thought that Discovery and Atlantis would just be in hangers or something. I think Andy means that NASA won't even consider another mission until the problem is investigated.

First off, what does the space program have to do with going to war? Why must it be one or the other? Yes it was a national tragedy, but it does not preclude defending ourselves from a tyrant.

Second, as should be obvious from above, Not everyone shares your views on going to war. I feel it is neessary. Furthermore I do not feel that it is about oil, either.

Lastly, there is not much a president can do to "help" the space program other than allocate funding, and support it publicly. Both of these are being done.

Discovery is currently out of service for overhaul, but Atlantis and Endeavour are doing something to the effect of sitting around a hangar.

(couldn't decide where exactly to post, so picked Lectric's post to respond to -- as I do have one thought on that....)

Friday evening I nominated "Peter Nevsky and the True Story of the Russian Moon Landing" by John Calvin Batchelor to my book club and it is now on the 2003 schedule. I have to say that when the clock radio turned on Saturday AM, I seriously thought I was dreaming.

After an overdose of CNN, I went out to work on the car (rewiring a few things) then I got an itch for a burger. I still had 15 pages left of "Nevsky" so took it with me. Hmmmm, when reading in a restaurant, I always thought it was a signal for other folks to leave you alone. No such luck.... three fishermen come in. Fisherman 1: "Hey, what're you reading?" (I show 'em) "Hey, what's it about?" (I say the supposed tragic Russian landing on the Moon). Boss fisherman: "Hey, I saw this documentary that we never landed on the Moon" (Me; "Uh-huh. Was it believable?" -- thinking that a gajillion tax dollars just went to refute this "documentary"). Boss Man "Well, do you always believe everything the governbment tells you??"

I told him "Yeah, I always believe what the government tells me" and went back to my book.

So these are my choices: Either believe "alien autopsy" stuff I see on Fox or believe everything the government says. I got the depressing feeling that the same three guys will be sitting there in 10 years (having just watched some supernatural expose documentary on Fox or "History" Channel) talking about the 7 people who disintegrated over Texas and how they never really existed -- just a big scheme by the government.

Lectric First off, what does the space program have to do with going to war? .

I just finished doing my taxes and verified that something between 25-35% of my income for 2002 went to the Feds. I think of myself of a federalist, so I don't generally gripe about that or kill myself to find ways to cheat or minimize my taxes. I just pay. I have to say that it is tough, though, in the times of the Reagans and Shrubs to pay that money with a smile on my face. They make like the pie is very elastic -- that we can have 600-ship navies, wars on Iraq and NASAs without going into massive debt. I'm no economist, but I know that is not true. Right now, I'd rather see more money tilted to things like NASA than our Iraq sequel. So maybe that's what NASA has to do with it....for me anyway.

All of the weekend's events made me thing of a book I read a few years back and enjoyed -- "Off the Planet" by Jerry Leninger (astronaut who took the length-of-stay record for American men on Mir). When thinking about the Russian space program's capabilities and relationship with ours post-Columbia, I think this book is interesting.

CNN and the networks seem hard at work digging up the personal angles on the disaster. It's hard to have positive feelings about all this right now -- about "the good that will come out" of this. If their is one "human angle" story that seems to sincerely hit the "touchie-feelie" side of this in a way that doesn't rankle, I think it has to be the story of Kalpana Chawla JMO.

I fear, though, that investigations are going to find organizational iimperfections, compromises, short-cuts. I'm concerned about whether we are willing to look again at NASA's situation with a dispassionate eye. Who is the Richard Feynmann for this set of hearings?

>>it was a pretty good shocker, as they go.

Excellent - I'm really looking forward to this. Just went to the cinema with the wife for the first time since our daughter was born (8 months ago) - thank goodness for babysitters - and saw Ghost Ship. Excellent gore and bodycount. Mostly predictable but a couple of nice twists.

Of course we never landed on the moon. We've also been covering up the aliens at Roswell for years now. That was after we purposely let the Japanese attack Pearl Harbour, but quite a few years before the CIA blew up the World Trade Center so that we could go to war with Afghanistan. Now, we are pretending like Iraq has chemical warheads so that we can go to war with Iraq, because W is pissed that Saddam tried to assassinate his dad and he's a Christian crusader intent on going to war with the Muslims. I mean, the US just has a proven track record with these things; after all, it took some balls to invent the whole holocaust thing. I'll tell you more when I finish watching Fox television. I think Joe Millionaire comes on right after John Edwards.

Oh, by the way, when am I going to get my next handout? I need my food stamps, welfare, and reparations payment now please. Oh yeah, and that time you liberating Europe after World War II instead of behaving like the Russians, that was entirely for your own self-interest.

-Fox-Watching Public

because W is pissed that

Off-topic aside... I love how most presidents get a three-initial nickname ("LBJ" for example), but our current one is down to just "W". Even better if you slur it: "Dubyah".

Of course we never landed on the moon.....

At least you didn't talk about the Kennedy assassination and the grasy knoll. I hate when people do that, because I don't have an alibi for that day...

tanstaafl.

I don't have an alibi for that day...

In general, I find that the fact that I wasn't born until 1976 seems to get me past most scrutiny in this regard.

In general, I find that the fact that I wasn't born until 1976 seems to get me past most scrutiny in this regard.

Where were you on the night that John Lennon was shot, sir?

Peter

Where were you on the night that John Lennon was shot, sir?

Surely, even if I was only four years old, I would have chosen to shoot the correct Beatle (Paul, of course.)

I contend that Chapman simply missed and hit something a foot or two to the side of what he was really aiming at: Yoko Ono. Had he been a better shot, he might have been hailed as a hero to this day.

I contend that Chapman simply missed and hit something a foot or two to the side of what he was really aiming at: Yoko Ono. Had he been a better shot, he might have been hailed as a hero to this day.

Thanks Bitt. I really needed that coffee to come out of my nose. ouch.

I find that the fact that I wasn't born until 1976 seems to get me past most scrutiny in this regard

Isn't that actually the year that they cloned you?

Okay, Ynot_ and Bitt get the funny award for the day.

<wipes off monitor... twice...>