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Pat Duggins
Pat Duggins
Senior News Analyst
pduggins@wmfe.org


 

Now, that Space Shuttle Atlantis is out on the launch pad, the countdown toward the end of the Shuttle program is beginning again. That begs the question, once the three spacecraft are grounded for good, who gets them? Sources at NASA say Kennedy Space Center, The Smithsonian, and Johnson Space Center in Houston are the most likely candidates to get a flown Shuttle orbiter, either Atlantis, Endeavour, or Discovery. We could get an inkling on who gets what next year when Atlantis is expected to be taken out of service first. It has an expensive year-long refurbishment period scheduled in 2008. Rather than spend that money on a Shuttle with two years of life left, Atlantis is likely to be put out to pasture.

If given a choice, which Shuttle do you think is the most historically valuable? Atlantis performed this first rendezvous and docking with the Russian Space Station Mir. Endeavour was NASA’s last "first flow" vehicle, meaning it was the last Shuttle to be brought into service. Discovery could be the most desirable since it performed both "return to flight missions" after the Challenger accident in 1986 and the loss of Columbia in 2003.

What are your thoughts? My e-mail is pduggins@wmfe.org.

 

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