NASA says Discovery is fit to return to earth

NASA says Discovery is fit to return to earth

Discovery Space Shuttle is coming back to earth on August 8. The news was confirmed by NASA today as it decided that the shuttle was safe for the trip and it required no more fixes. Earlier, the space agency was thinking about conducting a fourth spacewalk to make additional repairs to Discovery. The problem was a damaged piece of a thermal insulation blanket below the commander’s window on the craft.

NASA had fears that this piece would break off during the return and cause damage to the surface of the shuttle. The agency spent two days analyzing the side effects of this piece and decided against fixing the problem. They also notified the crew of the Shuttle currently residing on the International Space Station who were told that they are coming back earlier next week.

Discovery is the first Space Shuttle mission to space since the Columbia disaster in 2003. The shuttle got damaged during the takeoff and got completely destroyed when it entered the earth’s atmosphere while returning to earth. The incident resulted in the death of the entire crew on board including India’s Kalpana Chawla. NASA grounded the entire Space Shuttle fleet until they decided that they had fixed the problem.

The fleet is again grounded for similar problems and NASA has promised that they will find out a solution to falling debris from the Shuttle during the launching process. They had plans to launch Atlantis later this year for another mission to space. However, experiences with Discovery have shown them that there is more work to be done with the Shuttle to make it safe enough for another launch.