Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

That view from the external tank camera was absolutely magnificent! :D
Especially the shot of the Shuttle separating and pitching up! :yikes:

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

It looks like there was some debris separation from the external tank:

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

well it was a great view to see again... i saw it from my house and on tv so it was cool to see again.. i'll miss the night launches...those are really pretty to see...

but hats off to NASA ...we are again on our way...

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

A Slashdot user commented on the fact it appeared that Tiles fell off. If I could download a video or something, I'd like to see it, I mist have missed it on CNN.

It would have been cool to watch the carmera attached to it as it fell back to earth. but it unfortudently orbits for a good deal of time (as it had orbital veolicity when it seperates from the shuttle itself).

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Does anyone else get goosebumps when they hear the words, "ground launch sequencer is a go for auto sequence start?" I do, and I'm glad to see the shuttle program back.

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

A video from Cnn can be found here although I'll keep searching for a full video of the launch, that one only covered the first 2:40 of it. But watch around 2:20, when the external boosters detach, it freaks me out a little bit that its a flaming firefball that looks like its falling apart. The detachment I saw on the original webcast showed the main fuel booster coming off that was pretty cool. But it looks like Nasa is back in space.

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Welcome back, Discovery. :) We've missed you.

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Thanks for the link :)

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

I've just posted a thread in Chit-Chat on how to spot International Space Station and space shuttle discovery. So if you're interested go here

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Glad to finally see that shuttle up there again. IMO, I don't think anything that fell off looked too serious, except for maybe that little piece of tile, but I'm not the expert. Followed along with the mission broadcast on NASA TV all day, and it seems that they got every thing done that they needed to today, so thats good. Hope the rest of their mission is successful.

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Also, the top of the external fuel tank strikes a bird at liftoff.....poor bird :(

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Yeah, I saw those birds circling right over the launchpad, and I'm not really surprised. That must have been quite a knock, though. Today's launch (alright, yesterday's, but its still Tuesday for me) went beautifully. The onboard cameras also showed the incredible journey the shuttle takes when it is launched.

NASA continues to amaze me, especially at the precision and integrity of their work (one tiny error in one of hundreds of thousands of parts, miles of cable, and thousands of tiles can jeapordize the mission). Hats off to all the NASA engineers, who did an incredible job!

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

You may be right. . . I just heard that a small piece of foam tile broke off the shuttle but the crew is going to try and fix it.

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Woah, you got your info a little confused. The foam insulation on the external tank did shed in at least three places, but there are no such thing as foam tiles. The largest piece of foam was the one in the picture I posted, which came from the Protuberance Air Load (PAL) Ramp, while the two smaller ones came from the left bipod area (the area where the foam that hit Columbia came from). You can see a nice high-res picture of the tank missing all three pieces of foam at http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/123625main_s114e5070_high.jpg (1.5MB). While it doesn't look like the big foam piece hit anything, it is unknown what happened to the little pieces. However, even the big piece is smaller than the bipod ramp that hit Columbia. These cannot be repaired as the tank has already burned up in the atmosphere.

Seperately, a small piece of tile (approx. 1 square inch) chipped off the forward landing gear well door on the shuttle orbiter. This is not really a concern, as there have been literally thousands of documented tile shedding events, and none have resulted in vehicle damage during reentry (Columbia had a damaged RCC panel, which is very different).

There are currently no plans for actual tile repair on the vehicle. There are plans (which have always been part of the mission) to test repair methods on pre-damaged panels which are being stored in a box in the payload bay, but none of these repair methods are flight-certified yet. Unless the analysis of the LIDAR (laser scanner) data shows that a significant amount of tile is missing, this is not expected to change.

However, as a result of the foam shedding, the shuttle fleet has been grounded (meaning that Atlantis probably won't fly this year).

Re: NASA's Return to Flight Mission July 13!
 

Grounding the Shuttle again! :(

This is very upsetting, after we just made it back to space and everything. But i do agree that we have to fix all the problems so we will not have another disaster