Weather permitting, the space shuttle Discovery is due to touch down at Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD) on Tuesday on its way to the Smithsonian’s Udvar-Hazy Center.
In anticipation, the 3D simulation experts at Technology Integration Services have created a computer generated simulation of what that arriving flight might look like.
In ‘real life’, on Sunday NASA mounted the space shuttle Discovery on a jumbo jet in preparation for the flight from Florida to Virginia. (Here’s a link to a story describing how they did that and what will happen next).
For updated information on the delivery and display activities of all the space shuttles (Discovery, Enterprise, Endevour and Atlantis, see the Collect Space website, which is keeping track of all the comings and goings and has some incredible photos.
Turns out NASA hasn’t been focusing all its energy on poking around in space.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has also been creating a unique and, now, very valuable art collection.
Chip and Batty Explore Space, by William Wegman. Courtesy NASA Art Program
It started back in 1962 with the creation of the NASA Art Program and ever since then the agency has been inviting well known artists to document the space program.
The work includes paintings, drawings photographs, sculptures and other media by the likes of Annie Leibovitz, Nam June Paik, Robert Rauschenberg, Norman Rockwell, Andy Warhol, William Wegman (above) and Jamie Wyeth.
Curious to see what they’ve got? Starting Saturday, May 28, 2011, more than 70 pieces from the collection go on view in Washington, D.C. at the National Air and Space Museum.
Here are a few more samples:
This 1965 painting by Norman Rockwell shows astronauts John Young and Gus Grissom suiting up for the first flight of the Gemini program in March 1965. As in the William Wegman photo above, NASA loaned Norman Rockwell a spacesuit so the work would be as accurate as possible.
Liftoff at 15 seconds by Jack Perlmutter, 1982
Space Shuttle Columbia rises from Kennedy Space Center on its third flight into space, on March 22, 1982.
These and close to 70 other space-related art pieces from NASA’s collection are on display as part of NASA | ART: 50 Years of Exploration at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. May 28 – October 9, 2011.
It’s Souvenir Sunday, the day StuckatTheAirport.com celebrates the fun, inexpensive items you can find in airport shops.
This week our souvenirs come from the souvenir shop at the Astronaut Ellison S. Onizuka Space Center, which is located right next to the charming, open-air terminals at Kona International Airport.
The center is part museum/part education center and is dedicated to the memory of Ellison Onizuka, who was Hawaii’s first astronaut and one of the crewmembers who perished aboard the Challenger Mission on January 28, 1986.
The Onizuka Space Center is jam-packed with hands-on activities that explain space and space concepts as well as a wide variety of displays that include a piece of a moon rock, an Apollo 13 space suit and memorabilia that includes the freeze-dried macadamia nuts and Kona coffee NASA developed for Ellison Onizuka so that the Hawaiian astronaut would feel at home in space.
The museum is just a 30-second walk from the main part of Kona International Airport and is a much better way for you and your kids to spend your time than sitting out in the sun in airport’s post-security area.
Even if you don’t want to explore the space center’s exhibits, consider stopping in to check out the gift shop. It’s has a carefully selected assortment of space-related books, games and space-related souvenirs.
That’s where I picked up these cool, inexpensive and easy-to-carry fashion accessories: glow-in-the dark, Space Shaped Rubber Bands.
If you find a great souvenir while you’re stuck at the airport, please snap a photo and send it along.
The favorite souvenirs here at StuckatTheAirport.com are inexpensive (around $10), “of” the city or region and ideally, a bit offbeat. And if your souvenir is featured on Souvenir Sunday, you’ll receive a special airport or airline-related souvenir.
You have stuff to do. Deadlines. Work someone will pay you for if you just, you know, do it.
So you pour a cup of coffee and sit down at the computer.
But then, dang, the Internet happens.
Here’s a bit of what got me distracted today.
Air New Zealand posted time-lapse video footage of its first new domestic A320 being built and painted with all black livery.
The paint job has something to do with the All Blacks rugby team, so of course I had to visit that site and then the Small Blacks site as well.
As long as I was visiting the Air New Zealand site, I had to check in on what that wild and crazy furry creature, Rico, was up to. I found this reel of bloopers.
A quick check of email and Twitter sent me off in new directions.
Florida’s Dali Museum was opening in its snazzy new building in St. Petersburg, FL. And as someone who first came upon that museum collection, by accident, when it shared space with a factory in Cleveland, Ohio, I of course had to visit.
While there, I came across this clip of Salvador Dali as a guest on the old TV show, What’s My Line?
Then, of course, it was time to check email and Twitter and catch up on my RSS feed.
And then I really got tangled up in the web. A comment on the museum blog post mentioned Anita, “the spider from Skylab.” I didn’t know about Anita so had to follow that thread.
It turns out that Anita and a companion spider, Arabella, were part of an experiment flown on Skylab, a space station launched in May 1973.
According the Smithsonian website:
Scientists and students interested in the growth, development, behavior, and adaptation of organisms in weightlessness provided a variety of biology experiments for flight in the orbital research laboratory. A common Cross spider, “Anita” participated in a web formation experiment suggested by a high school student. The experiment was carried out on the Skylab 3 mission, which lasted 59 days from July 28-September 25, 1973. Astronauts Alan Bean, Jack Lousma, and Owen Garriott carried out the scientific research in space, reported the results, and returned this specimen at the end of their mission. NASA then sent Anita, a companion spider “Arabella,” and the experiment equipment to the Museum.
With the help of Twitter-buddy Isaac Alexander, I spent a good chunk of this Labor Day weekend putting together a list of aerospace museums to keep track of and, perhaps, to feature on Museum Mondays here at StuckatTheAirport.com.
The process took quite a bit longer than it might have because I kept clicking on links at these museum websites and, well, you know how that goes… a half hour later I’d get back to the task at hand.
So for Museum Monday this week, I’ll just share a few of the links that caught my eye.
Named in honor of four-time astronaut Thomas P. Stafford, a post on this museum’s site sent me to a Gizmodo posting of a half-dozen awe-inspiring time lapse videos from space.
Here’s one:
And I can’t even remember now which museum site sent me to this video about jobs in aviation – circa 1947 – but I had to stop and watch the entire thing.
Have you visited a great aviation or space-related museum lately? Share your favorite here and it may be featured on a future edition of Museum Monday.
