Discovery safely home

Space shuttle Discovery made a picture perfect landing at Kennedy Space Center on runway 15 at about 8:15 this morning. Discovery and crew completed a successful mission, which elapsed over 12 days, and 5.3 million miles. The whole process of reentry went about as smooth as possible. There was a last minute change of runway as mission control decided just before 8 am to change from runway 33 to runway 15. The weather was overcast and cloud cover was the reason for the runway change. Just a quick fact that absolutely blows my mind every time I hear it but once again as I was watching the whole thing this morning I heard it again. At about 25 minutes prior to landing Discovery was traveling at Mach 24.9 or about 17,000 miles per hour. 17,000 to 0 in 25 minutes that is a quick turn around. Intelligent Confusion would like to congratulate the crew of Discovery and NASA for a great and successful mission, and of course a safe return home.

The next shuttle launch is just around the corner as it is scheduled for sometime in August. The shuttle this time will be Atlantis, and the mission will be STS-115.