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It looks like a speck of dust on the surface of the sun. But this spectacular picture shows the space shuttle Atlantis alongside the International Space Station (ISS) silhouetted as they orbit the earth. The image was taken in Normandy by French astrophotographer Thierry Legault. He used a digital camera attached to a £5,000 specially kitted-out telescope. The shuttle, which returned last week from a 12-day mission, and the space station can be seen in orbit 250 miles above the earth while the sun is 93 million miles away.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA makes its fifth attempt to get Atlantis off the launch pad at 11:15 a.m. EDT on Saturday. If the mission is scrubbed again, the space agency must abandon for a few weeks its efforts to send the shuttle off on a construction mission at the international space station.

Looks like a wonderful day for a launch.....

Five hours after starting space shuttle Atlantis on a slow crawl toward its hangar, NASA changed course Tuesday and sent it back to the launch pad, saying the forecast for Tropical Storm Ernesto had improved. Atlantis was almost halfway into the 12-hour journey back to the Vehicle Assembly Building aboard a giant, caterpillar-track platform when NASA reversed course Tuesday afternoon. "The hurricane track has taken it further west to where the winds have diminished and where we can tolerate them at the pad," said NASA spokesman Bill Johnson. Ernesto's peak winds were expected to be less than 79 mph, the...

FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 2006 1430 GMT (10:30 a.m. EDT) The shuttle Atlantis' countdown continues to tick smoothly toward launch on a space station assembly mission. Liftoff is targeted for 4:30 p.m. Sunday. The latest forecast calls for a 60 percent chance of favorable weather, improving to 80 percent "go" Monday and Teusday. The concern Sunday is for possible afternoon thunderstorms within the launch area. =================================================

CAPE CANAVERAL - NASA is poised to pick up the countdown to launch of shuttle Atlantis this week after swapping out two suspect bolts securing a key communications antenna inside the ship's cargo bay. The work, which was finished Sunday at Kennedy Space Center's launch pad 39B, put NASA in position to start a three-day countdown Thursday. Liftoff of Atlantis and six astronauts remains scheduled for about 4:30 p.m. Sunday. "Everything is looking good," said KSC spokeswoman Tracy Young. Working atop a platform and scaffolding near the top of the shuttle's six-story payload bay, technicians replaced two of the four...

NASA has decided it will have an orbiter on standby for a rescue mission for every Space Shuttle flight to the end of the programme in 2010. After the 2003 Columbia accident, NASA planned for contingency Space Shuttle support missions to rescue a damaged orbiter's crew from the International Space Station (ISS), which would act as a safe haven. Since the July 2005 Discovery/STS 114 return to flight mission, NASA has had a Shuttle undergoing pre-launch processing to prepare it to rescue a crew within 45 days of an in-orbit Shuttle emergency being declared. The agency's stated goal was to...

Family, friends cheer on McAllen astronauthttp://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA071806.1A.valley.space.169b85e.html http://tinyurl.com/zs9yd Web Posted: 07/17/2006 11:02 PM CDT Jesse Bogan Rio Grande Valley Bureau McALLEN — The recent e-mail from outer space informed the small group the voyage had been safe and rewarding. Their supporting role was almost over. "Now the shuttle is just about packed and ready to come home," astronaut Mike Fossum, 48, who grew up in McAllen, wrote them from the space shuttle Discovery on Sunday. "We're all ready, too — our objectives have been met." Hours later, on Monday morning, they gathered before a large television screen in Fossum's boyhood home,...

This is will be the live thread for the Space Shuttle Discovery Landing (weather permitting that is).

Scouts played large part in Fossum's lifehttp://www.themonitor.com/SiteProcessor.cfm?Template=/GlobalTemplates/Details.cfm&StoryID=14170&Section=Local http://tinyurl.com/ru9qt July 12, 2006 Marc B. Geller Monitor Staff Writer McALLEN — One of the biggest influences in Mike Fossum’s life growing up in the Rio Grande Valley was his experience in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts. Beverly Alleyn, who like Fossum’s mother is a nurse, was his Cub Scout pack leader. And her husband, Mickey, led the Webelos program that Mike needed to complete with other Cub Scouts to transition into Boy Scouts. The Alleyns’ son, Rob, now a McAllen physician, was one of Mike’s classmates and rose with Mike through the...

For San Diego area, looks like it may pass right in front of Jupiter if we are lucky.. http://www.heavens-above.com/PassDetails.asp?SatID=25544&lat=32.7921&lng=-117.1211&alt=100&loc=San+Diego+Marathon&TZ=PST&Date=38908.1442576723 Put in city here to see if you can see them pass over....... http://www.heavens-above.com/selecttown.asp?CountryID=US&lat=0&lng=0&alt=0&loc=Unspecified&TZ=CET

4.5 MB Quicktime movie http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/video/shuttle/sts-121/mpg/srb_fd01h_ra.mpg

The protruding gap filler is located toward the tip of the starboard wing, about five tiles back from the leading edge RCC panels, and is between panels 16 and 17. Difficult location to reach.

Up to five pieces of debris that could be foam insulation fell off the space shuttle Discovery's troublesome external fuel tank shortly after lift-off, according to NASA. The shuttle blasted off from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida at 19.38 BST. About three minutes later, three or four pieces of debris were seen flying off the fuel tank, and another popping off a bit later, said shuttle programme manager Wayne Hale. Discovery was so high by then that there wasn't enough air to accelerate the pieces into the shuttle and cause damage, he said. "That is the very raw,...

NASA's Space Shuttle Tracking Page It's taking a LOOONG time to load...but it's pretty cute with the little shuttle!

Third time the charm?

NASA gave the green light Monday night for a Fourth of July shuttle liftoff despite worries about a piece of foam that popped off Discovery's external fuel tank while the spacecraft sat on the launch pad. The decision was sure to stir more debate about whether the space agency was putting its flight schedule ahead of safety. The 3-inch triangular piece of foam that appeared to come from a 5- inch-long crack late Sunday or early Monday is far smaller than the foam chunk that brought down Columbia, killing seven astronauts in But NASA managers spent most of Monday...

Engineers inspecting the shuttle Discovery's external tank following Sunday's launch scrub found a crack in the tank's foam insulation near a bracket holding a 17-inch oxygen feed line in place. Some engineers believe the crack must be repaired but senior managers say a variety of options are on the table, from fly as is to making repairs. As of this writing, no decisions have been made about how to proceed and it's not known what impact the work might have on plans to make a third attempt to launch Discovery Tuesday. Engineers also found a small piece of foam insulation...

Boy Scouts Hoped Shuttle Discovery Would Have Launchedhttp://www.team4news.com/Global/story.asp?S=5105676 July 2, 2006, 05:49 PM Reported by Anabel Marquez McAllen Space shuttle Discovery is on the launch pad in Florida. But it isn't going anywhere. As people waited to see the discovery's lift-off Saturday, NASA officials called off the expedition due to bad weather. In the Valley, members of McAllen Boy Scout Troop 7 gathered at one of the boy scouts' houses to watch the launch. They were excited about Astronaut Michael Fossum, a former Eagle Scout from their troop - leap into space. "It's just such a small world that he...

Looks like a good start to for the 4th of July Weekend....