[b4its2late]

Hey Jim! Kev here. I watched the launch and followed the live thread on FR. I just happen to log on at the right time. Didn't see anything in the local rag on the launch. I was watching on NASA TV on the internet. It was a great shot, the camera they had.

But as they were going up into orbit at enormous speeds, I thought to myself, there is allot of space junk up there. How the heck do the miss it all? I mean, look at the planes that suck a duck into the engine. The chances of that are probably small here with gravity and all, but this junk is floating around all over up there.

I hope and pray this turns out ok. Wonder how long they can stay on the space station?

[GonzoGOP]

"Wonder how long they can stay on the space station"

Oddly enough if they can get all three solar panels up and working they could stay there almost forever, at least so long as they can keep sending progress cargo ships up with food and CO2 scrubbers. In theory we could just let the shuttle up there and bring the crew down 2 at a time aboard that paragon of 1950s technology Soyuz. Of course it's going to be short of food, water and living space until they can get the supply problem straightened out. Think Apollo 13 but without the quick return.

[null and void]

The thing about space, is that there is lots of it...