[John Jamieson]

I wonder about the numbers we're using.

STS97 was a ISS mission that brought up big parts, no metion of heavy returning payload, yet we know that Columbia was heavier than Anlantis and was bring back a 20,000 pound Double SpaceHab that itself can be loaded with up to 9,000 pounds of experiments. The numbers don't jive.

Could Columbia have really been pushing 250,000 pounds?

[r9etb]

STS97 was a ISS mission ...

Typo on my part. What I meant was STS-95.

Typical landing weight for a Shuttle "deployable mission" runs right around 200,000 lb., plus or minus about 5,000. So the number sounds about right.

BTW: STS-58 landing weight was close to this mission: 229,753 lb.