Fly me to the moon..
The postponed Space Shuttle Mission STS-127 may have been further delayed until July, but yesterday the more conventional Atlas V rocket successfully launched Nasa’s Lunar Reconnaisance Orbiter [LRO] and Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite [LCROSS]. LRO is expected to reach the Moon on Tuesday at 5.43am [EDT]. LCROSS and the Centaur rocket will stay attached for a further 4 months when the empty upper stage will be guided on a collision course with a permanently shaded crater at the Moon’s pole on Oct 9. And here’s the stunning launch video.
It cost too much but it is still fascinating.
The quality of the film is exceptionaly good – it will renew our interest in the moon as place of the imagination.
After the worst drones in the universe visited it in the 1970s – spreading as Lily Tomlin said ‘banality throughout the cosmos’