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From: barmar@mit-eddie.UUCP (Barry Margolin)
Newsgroups: net.columbia
Subject: Re: "WHADDYA MEAN WE CAN'T CIRCLE FOR A LANDING???!!"
Message-ID: <1686@mit-eddie.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 26-Apr-84 18:19:21 EST
Article-I.D.: mit-eddi.1686
Posted: Thu Apr 26 18:19:21 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 27-Apr-84 06:21:38 EST
References: <160@sb6.UUCP>
Organization: MIT, Cambridge, MA
Lines: 23

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Does anyone know what happens say
if the shuttle is up in space the maximum number of days, HAS to land, and
there's bad weather at both the Cape and Edwards?

Other military airports?
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I think this is a very unlikely situation.  First of all, the mission
schedules probably leave lots of leeway between the planned landing and
the "HAS to land" time, so it is unlikely that the weather would be bad
at both EAFB (in a desert) and KSC.  Also, the shuttle CAN land in
imperfect weather; NASA has just chosen so far to play it extremely
safe, since we are still new at this game.  Finally, in an extreme
emergency, I have heard a rumor that it is possible to land the shuttle
on some ordinary runways (like Kennedy Int'l in NYC, although they would
probably choose a military airport); one problem with this would be that
they would have to erect a crane there in order to mount the shuttle on
the 747 to bring it back to the Cape.
-- 
			Barry Margolin
			ARPA: barmar@MIT-Multics
			UUCP: ..!genrad!mit-eddie!barmar