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[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

The Crew of the Space Shuttle to fly in May

The STS-114 mission of the next shuttle flight will launch off in May 2005 after a two year hold.

These seven astronauts take a break from training to pose for the STS-114 crew portrait. In front are astronauts Eileen M. Collins (right), commander; Wendy B. Lawrence, mission specialist; and James M. Kelly, pilot. In back are astronauts Stephen K. Robinson (left), Andrew S. W. Thomas, Charles J. Camarda, and Soichi Noguchi, all mission specialists. Noguchi represents Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

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Lets wish them well in a safe and successful mission.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Discovery seen from space
SPACEFLIGHT NOW
Posted: April 6, 2005

Here is quite a cool shot taken from orbit of the Shuttle on roll out.

International Space Station commander Leroy Chiao spotted Discovery from 225 miles above Earth today and snapped this photograph of the shuttle as it was being rolled from the Vehicle Assembly Building to launch pad 39B. Credit: NASA, enhanced by William Harwood

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Here I go again, if the crew can take this shot from 200 miles up, and with a hand held camera no less...why can't we get decent shots of the Apollo sites from lunar orbiting crafts? Even if we double the height, a great many details can still be seen.

I just don't know, but it's a cool shot anyway!

[Maddad]

The moon's a thousand times further away than low Earth orbit.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Clementine and SMART 1 are in Moon orbit. At closest lunar approach around 300/400 miles +/-.

You actually didn't believe that in any way, that I thought the landing sites could be photgraphed from the ISS with a hand held camera or anywhere near Earth orbit...excluding the Hubble?

Course not.