back to article Ex-NASA space shuttle to touch down on aircraft carrier

In a move sure to delight aerospace fans everywhere, it has been announced that one of NASA's retired space shuttles will make a landing in the harbour of New York City next year – onto the deck of an aircraft carrier. Orbiter Enterprise launches from the back of a carrier jumbo during 1970s test flights. Credit: NASA JSC …

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  1. Torben Mogensen

    Air and Space Museum

    I saw Enterprise at the Air and Space Museum near Dulles Airport in Washington this summer. But I guess they have been offered one of the shuttles that actually went to space (Atlantis, maybe), so they won't have room for Enterprise anymore.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Discovery is going to the Air and Space Museum, Endeavour to the California Science Center in LA and Atlantis will remain at KSC.

  2. Captain TickTock
    Joke

    Hey guys!

    - I know what we can get to replace the Harriers!

    1. Marvin the Martian

      Fair trade indeed!

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Noooooooooo...

    ...oooooooooooooooooooo :(

    After seeing the condition their A-12 / SR-71 is in i'm sad they they got a Concorde and now a Shuttle :/

    1. jason 7
      FAIL

      Yes, poor conditions to keep such artifacts.

      Total lack or respect there. Horrific.

      Would have been better to put it in Duxford!

    2. ElNumbre
      Stop

      I always loved the 'look' of the museum but thought the conditions of the New Yoik environment not very conducive to the long term preservation of such unique human endeavours.

      Plus, they allowed Will Smith to use the A-12 as a golf driving range (according to the movies anyway).

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Salty sea/air and planes don't mix well.

      Even the old Sea Harriers specifically built for the environment couldn't stand the rust inducing environment. No surprise air craft built for normal usage would fall to bits there, just being out in the open 24x7 would require massive investments to keep them from decaying rapidly.

      I'm certain if Duxford had been offered one they would have built a hander specially for it, rigth next to the USAF hanger (which is full).

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The title missed all 4 arrestor cables.

    "And instead of screaming in to the carrier's deck at 230 mph(...)"

    Now that would be something I'd like to see. If it could be done, of course.

    1. alien anthropologist
      Paris Hilton

      @The title missed all 4 arrestor cables.

      Doubt that it could be done - the glide slope is a lot steeper than a normal approach with a longer round out that eats more runway space.

      But armchair pilots can have a bash at simulating this using x-plane.com - as it at least got a half-decent flight model for the Orbiter (unlike the older Microsoft title).

      But then it would be more fun to rather shoot touch and go's on Paris...

      1. ElNumbre
        Black Helicopters

        X-Plane

        I can't even get the Orbiter through the atmosphere without entering some kind of death spiral, let alone landing it. Id love to see a Youtube video of a carrier landing Shuttle though. :)

  5. Northern Fop
    Flame

    Bastards

    Har-de-fucking-har what a *hiliariously* misleading article title. Seriously, my sides have just split.

    Have you any idea how excited I got thinking about the shuttle landing on a mother-fucking aircraft carrier? Spectacle of the decade. How much are flights to the US? This I *have* to see.

    But no. Anti-fucking-climax of the year. Thanks a lot for abso-fucking-lutely nothing but a great big, fat sense of disappointment.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      welcome to my life.

      One big disappointment.. and all the diodes down my left side give me a pain as well.

      Ok - off to park some cars now.

      ....

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    No Flying Concorde Or Space Shuttle.

    We are no longer going forward, it will be steam trains and horses next.

    1. Dark Horse

      Don't jest!

      Have you seen the state of the state of our roads?

      With all the pot holes from the last two or three year's worth of winters and the councils not wanting to fix them, we'll be back to horse and cart before we know it!

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      re: No Flying Concorde...

      USSR, iirc, had a nuclear steam train built. The steam going out of the reactor would power a turbine, and go back to close the loop.

      No, I'm just joking. James Bond movies thought it first, or were inspired by a real one, I can't say. Yes, the one where JB chases the bad guys in a Trabant, while he is in a T-34 tank.

      And I thought the tank was more agile than the puny car too.

      Coal may be out, not steam.

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