Jun 6 1999
From The Space Library
Space Shuttle Discovery landed safely at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Shortly before returning to Earth, astronauts aboard Discovery had completed their last assignment, releasing Starshine, an educational satellite that 25,000 students worldwide would track over the following seven to eight months, to calculate the atmosphere's density. The US$1 million Starshine, a 19-inch (48.3-centimeter) sphere, "covered with 878 small, circular mirrors" that schoolchildren had polished, had become visible from the ground once it had "popped" from its canister in the Shuttle's cargo bay. In addition, the astronauts had spent six of their 10 days in orbit at the new International Space Station (ISS), where the crew had performed maintenance tasks. Discovery's crew had delivered 2 tons (1,800 kilograms or 1.8 tonnes) of tools, water, and other supplies for the first permanent crew of the ISS, scheduled to arrive in the spring of 2000.
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