I was out on the airfield at Heathrow when the 747/Shuttle combo did the fly-by in the early eighties (09L approach & go-around) and the weather then was really grotty, low cloud, some rain in the air, not very good viz. Perhaps they impose greater limits these days or they just thought that was typical Eurpoean weather!!
Flew into Stansted (Mrs Odd One in command) a couple of days later to look at it in closeup - awesome!
Presumably it did the Atlantic crossing all in one go, so why not cross from Edwards to KFC, sorry KSC, all in one hop?
Cheers,
The Odd One