Go Discovery!

[Lifted Up]

Hopefully this morning...if the weather cooperates.

STS-120 is the 23rd shuttle mission to the International Space Station, and will launch an Italian-built U.S. multi-port module for the station.

Retired Air Force Col. Pamela A. Melroy will command the STS-120 mission to take the Node 2 connecting module to the station. Melroy, a veteran shuttle pilot, is the second woman to command a shuttle. Marine Corps Col. George D. Zamka will serve as pilot. The flight's mission specialists will be Scott E. Parazynski, Army Col. Douglas H. Wheelock, Stephanie D. Wilson and Paolo A. Nespoli, a European Space Agency astronaut from Italy. Zamka, Wheelock and Nespoli will be making their first spaceflight.

Expedition 15/16 Flight Engineer Clayton Anderson will return to Earth from the space station aboard shuttle mission STS-120. That flight will carry his replacement, Daniel Tani, to the station. Tani will return on shuttle mission STS-122.

[Lifted Up]

No replies? Well, space shuttles are a little bit like baseball unpiring (Why do I have to keep bringing up that subject?) . When nothing goes wrong, nobody knows who the ump is. When things are not routine, everyome is looking and commenting (Just ask Tim McClellend about the playoffs this year and about his rookie pine tar year).

Launch went well after they shed worries about a chunk of ice on the fuel line. Now they have work to do.

[polar bear]

How's that Canada Arm doing?? (Break a leg eh?)

[Belle]

Lifted, I didn't see this. :( I started a different thread yesterday.

Yes, I watched it go up with a party of co-workers. We always meet in the parking lot to watch it explode through the clouds and stand there, necks back, mouths agape, fascinated until it's long gone from our line of sight.

Yesterday we didn't get to see the rocket boosters fall off due to the trajectory, but sometimes we CAN see them fall.

We have some new folks from WI in our office and it was their first launch, which is always exciting. :)