Is There Nothing It Can't Do?

I have been following the story of the Space Shuttle's journey to dock with the International Space Station. I still find it amazing that people are brilliant enough to not only send people into space, but to bring them back. It's the coming back part that seems the trickiest. Any yahoo can strap a guy to a missile and shoot him off, but it takes a real brainiac to bring him back. It seems odd to me that people have become so jaded that this isn't a big deal anymore. "Oh yeah, the space shuttle. We still have that thing? Hey did you see that Britney dyed her hair?"

There was some concern over the Shuttle's re-entry the other day. A piece of filler on the heat shield was hanging off and NASA was investigating whether it would cause a problem. I don't know about you, but if I were millions of miles from Earth in a tin can, I'd consider it a problem. As I watched this I kept wondering "why don't they just go out and push it back in?" I don't want to drive to the grocery store with a piece of trim hanging off my car, let alone blast through Earth's atmosphere. I'm not a very handy guy, but seeing the pictures I figured they could just use some duct tape and everything would be fine. "Brian, you're an idiot. NASA is a multi billion dollar agency. They would never resort to using Duct tape to repair anything. Why don't you put a cool towel on your head and think of candy. Leave space travel and shuttle repair to the professionals." Yeah, you may be thinking that, but you're wrong.

A report came from NASA today that during one of the space walks, the strps on an astronaut's jet pack kept coming loose. These packs are used in case the astronaut needs to change direction or move quickly while in the dark recesses of space. If a hand hold or foot support were to give way, these packs allow the astronaut to get safely back instead of becoming a piece of space debris. Well what do you think they're using to make sure that the brackets don't come loose anymore? You guessed it, duct tape. It seems weird to me too. I would have thought that NASA would have some high tech adhesive or a "space age polymer" that they could use. Nope, they're just like you and me. Some forward thinking rocket scientist ran over to Home Depot before the launch and stuffed a roll of duct tape under the seat.

Maybe I'm not so dumb after all huh? I hope they have some of the cool colored tape. I'd hate to see an astronaut flying around looking like a beat up Chevy. Later...Brian