David Azhar Appeal Blog

Space fleet for sale!

February 12, 2010 on 7:55 pm | In David's Updates | No Comments

I now know what we can fundraise for, a space shuttle!! 

The three shuttles-Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour-are worth $28.2m (£17.7m) each which is a bargain when originally they were worth $42 million (£25.8 m) but the price was plummeted to take in the cost of hauling the monster from the Kennedy Space Centre to a major US airport.

Eight-seaters Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour have a combined mileage of 341,311,994, a top speed of 17,231mph. The space planes have been launched 129 times since 1981 and have completed 13,662 orbits.

Technically, the shuttles aren’t “for sale.” They remain the property of NASA and its official repository for artifacts, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. But the Air & Space Museum is only taking one ship — Discovery — which leaves Atlantis and Endeavour up for grabs — assuming, or course, all three make it safely through their last year of flying. 

The United States is retiring the fleet after five more missions to complete construction of the International Space Station. By the end of this year, the shuttles will be ready for their new mission as museum pieces.

What a great story!! Haha!