The shuttle Discovery landed in California by Magdalena Rosova

The space shuttle Discovery almost collided with a piece of orbital trash last Thursday. At that moment astronauts inside the shuttle were preparing for a landing in Florida. Rick Sturckow, a commander of the shuttle, together with pilot Kevin Ford fired engines of the shuttle for 14 seconds to dodge the space junk. The space trash did not endangered NASA's plan to land the shuttle at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. However, it was the bad weather condition near the center that forced it to touch down in Californian desert one day later. The shuttle landed at 8:53 at Edwards Air Force base in the Mojave Desert. Flight controllers wanted the Discovery to land at K! ennedy Space Center because it is less expensive and now it will take a week before the shuttle can be ready for next mission. According to NASA, it will costs about $1.7 million dollars to bring the shuttle back to the center. Aim of the 13-day mission to the international space station was to make repairs and deliver supplies, science gear and treadmill called Stephen Colbert, named after TV comedian. The crew consisting of 7 astronauts performed three spacewalks and replaced one member of the station's crew. Astronaut Tim Kopra spent almost two months in the space station and now was replaced by astronaut Nicole Stott. The Discovery also took a Disney toy of Buzz Lightyear, which ended his own 15-month space mission. Buzz came to the station in May 2008 as a part of an educational campaign. After his return he is planned to be welcomed as a hero at Walt Disney World in Florida. There are six more space missions remaining on the NASA schedule.

related story (sgx15341): http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/09/11/space.shuttle.landing...

by Magdalena Rosova for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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