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Part of a platter for a women who is turning 33. The colors are off since it's pouring rain and dark and dreary. She asked for purple, orange, bright pink and emerald green. She's going to Legoland, the Kennedy Space Center and on a road trip.
Composite of 14 images of the Space Shuttle Discovery launch shot from the boardwalk at the beach at Marineland, Florida.
The workflow this time:
File > Scripts > Load Files into Stack...
Select "Create Smart Object after Loading Layers"
Layer > Smart Objects > Stack Mode > Maximum
I'm going to order a print of this one and see how it looks.
a view of the shuttle launch pads in the background, coreopsis covered sand dunes in the foreground.
The excitement from the kids was amazing. I couldn't have asked for better people with whom to view this historic event.
Heat shield tiles. I love that you can see the heat damage on the old ones and the new ones for comparison.
Space Shuttle Discovery is bathed in light on Launch Pad 39B. Seen above the external tank is the vent hood (known as the "beanie cap") at the end of the gaseous oxygen vent arm. Vapors are created as the liquid oxygen in the external tank boil off and the hood vents the gaseous oxygen vapors away from the shuttle. Below it is the orbiter access arm with the White Room at the end, through which the crew accesses the orbiter.
Discovery is scheduled to launch on mission STS-116 at on Saturday, Dec. 9. On the mission, the crew will deliver truss segment, P5, to the International Space Station and begin the intricate process of reconfiguring and redistributing the power generated by the two pairs of solar arrays. The P5 will be mated to the P4 truss that was delivered and attached during the STS-115 mission in September.
Image credit: NASA/George Shelton
Space Shuttle Atlantis lifting off on mission STS-117. This is just after solid rocket booster (SRB) separation--you can see them peeling off as the shuttle keeps on going.
Pima Air and Space Museum
SPACE SHUTTLE PROGRAM FIXED BASE GUIDANCE AND NAVIGATION SIMULATOR
One of only three advanced space shuttle orbiter simulators used to train NASA astronauts.
The fixed-base Guidance and Navigation Simulator (GNS) represents one of only three simulators once used to train astronauts for the Space Shuttle Program at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Along with the motion-base Shuttle Mission Simulator (SMS) and the Fixed-Base Simulator (FBS), these complex machines were used to create a series of various mission tasks ranging from full mission rehearsals down to recreating specific exercises such as atmosphere entry or launching satellites.
Predating the SMS and FBS, the GNS was built in the late 1970s and operational by 1982. Initially it was primarily used only to test and verify guidance and navigation software that would later be installed in the SMS, FBS, and orbiters. As such it originally did not have visual computer-generated windscreen displays and much of the interior was unfinished, though it did contain the same complex array of cockpit instrumentation, controls, and computer displays operated by five distinct general-purpose computers (GPC) present in actual orbiters.
Following the Challenger accident investigation, the Rogers Commission suggested that NASA invest in additional crew training simulators to provide increased and expanded training and to handle the higher frequency of missions. However, the cost of providing an additional SMS or FBS proved too expensive, so NASA elected to upgrade the GNS into a full fixed-base crew simulator that was essentially identical to the FBS.
The upgraded GNS flight deck was enhanced to provide a more realistic appearance and a full visual computer-generated imagery system for the six forward facing windscreens. Computer-generated imagery (CGI) was a new science in the early 1980s and all the simulators used a first-generation CGI system, rudimentary by today's standards.
For 20 years the upgraded GNS was used interchangeably with the FBS and it is likely that every post-Challenger crew spent time in the GNS practicing launch, ascent, orbit, re-entry, and landing procedures.
With the end of the Space Shuttle Program, the GNS was retired in 2011. In late 2020 the GNS was used on the set of a science fiction movie due to be released in late 2021 [not sure why they’re being cryptic, its Roland Emmerich’s Moonfall]. The filmmakers modified the simulator's external appearance, making the GNS more closely resemble the outer surface of an actual orbiter, along with internal cabin modifications. Following movie shooting, the GNS flight deck was donated to the Pima Air & Space Museum in early 2021.
The Space Shuttle on its way through the rural parts of Devon to yet another training session. c.2005