Discovery ready to fly

In this photo, the Space Shuttle Discovery sits atop the Shuttle Carrier  Aircraft at the Mate/Demate Facility at Kennedy Space Center.  Tomorrow morning, it will be flown to Dulles Airport outside Washington, D.C.  There it will find a home at the Smithsonian Institution's Udvar Hazy Facility for historic aircraft.

The Space Shuttle test vehicle, Enterprise, has been property of the Smithsonian Institution since 1985, and has been displayed at Udvar Hazy since the facility's opening.  Enterprise will be loaded onto the carrier aircraft and  flown to New York City for display at the Intrepid Sea, Air, and Space Museum.  This flight is scheduled for Thursday of this week, weather permitting.

It's sad for those of us who worked in the Space Shuttle Program and experienced over 30 years of flights to see these unique vehicles put out to pasture.  There is not likely to be anything to equal them for a very long time.