brockenspectre

This morning Space Shuttle Endeavour has started her "piggy-back-ride" to California.

Here are some pics I snagged via NASA TV - she is going to overfly the area local to KSC (including Orlando Intl Airport and Walt Disney World) before heading off, via Mississippi and Lousiana (New Orleans) to Cali


Lining up

approaching KSC for fly past

Loose rivets

Er, were those trees chopped down for a short visit, and not its final resting place?

11Fan

She's (just about) home. Just landed at LAX about an hour ago. This shot was taken as she was flying over Disneyland California.

ion_berkley

This AM...

Loose rivets

So, what . . . the trees were cut down for a short visit? Please tell me that level of vandalism just didn't happen.

I know it went before a judge, and he approved the continued destruction, but I thought it was all about taking it to its final resting place.

Lyman

World's largest biplane.

negative stagger

con-pilot

No, not a short visit, that will be its home forever more. Or until some environmentalist makes California get rid of it for some stupid reason.

The trees are being replanted, actually they are planting more than there were originally.

Dushan

Still think it is a shame and a waste to cut down mature trees for something like this. No matter how many more are planted it will take 50 years for them to grow to the level that the ones that are cut.

They figured out how to fly the damn thing into space and back, surely they could figure out a better way to get it 12 miles into the city. Even if they didn't want to cut it and re-assemble (why not, it's not as if it will ever fly again) they could tilt it and take it that way. No?

I am not greenie or an environmentalist, far from it, but this just seems like a huge waste.

Lyman

Imo.

My neighbor is pulling out fifty year old almond trees to grow something else, it will be cut into firewood.Two thousand trees.

These trees that were cut in the Southland are landscaping.

Trees are sustainable. The Shuttle is not.

Landscaping. I cannot begin to work up a resentment over this.

CleeIB

The PPRuNe/IB offices overlook LAX, so we got some nice views of a few flyovers and final landing:

Milo Minderbinder

first time I've ever seen a photo of one with a fairing over the motors

When I first saw the pix I assumed the identity was wrong and it was the glider, Enterprise

Matari

Wow Sultan, if a post was ever worthy of a permanent banning, that one was. Taking a tribute thread, and using lives of American heros to score crass, cheap political points? Un-effing believable even by your standards.

Milo Minderbinder

Almonds - like cherries and plums, of which they are close relatives, are pretty much on borrowed time after fifty years.
They're not especially long-lived trees, unlike e.g. beech, oak or elm

500N

That's a really nice fly by.

I doubt many pilots have had the opportunity to fly low and slow
the full length of LAX.


The extra pieces on the 747 tail look almost comical being square
when everything else is streamlined.

Dushan

I knew The Sultan can pretty much blame everything on GWB, but now the Challenger disaster is Reagan's fault? Wow!

con-pilot

'Despicable' is not an expressive enough adjective to describ 'The Sultan's entire post.

Lyman

To remind, (only)

I think we may have been inadvertently punk'd.

Like some Muslims...

Sayin

con-pilot

I'm just about positive that all the times the shuttles were ferried on the back of the 747, that fairing was installed. I believe that this was because of the turbulence caused by engine nozzles on the tail of the 747.

I could be wrong about that, but I think I read that on a NASA press release years ago.

Lyman

I think the first few transits were sans fairing, and directional stability for the hybrid was problematic. I don't know which came first, the outriggers, or the fairing, but they were an add, I think.

500N

con pilot

"I'm just about positive that all the times the shuttles were ferried on the back of the 747, that fairing was installed. I believe that this was because of the turbulence caused by engine nozzles on the tail of the 747.

I could be wrong about that, but I think I read that on a NASA press release years ago."



I think you are correct. I was going to post something similar as I had read the same thing not long ago.