Word: pads
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...crowded the beaches and causeways around the Kennedy Space Center last week, and for millions of other Americans clustered around TV sets, the tension was palpable. As the countdown clock flashed out the number of seconds until lift-off, the eyes of an entire nation focused on Launch Pad 39-B and the gleaming white shuttle Discovery, flanked by its two solid rocket boosters and clinging to the side of the giant, rust- colored external fuel tank. In the minds of many, however, another vision intruded: the hellish yellow-orange burst in the middle of a Y-shaped cloud that...
Finally, spectators joined in for the last 15 seconds of countdown, the engines ignited and the shuttle rose majestically from the pad, carrying its crew of five veteran astronauts. Over the space center's loudspeakers came the triumphant announcement: "Americans return to space, as Discovery clears the tower." But the cheers were muted as the crowd -- many with clenched fists, gritted teeth and teary eyes -- nervously watched the spacecraft rise on its pillar of flame, then begin its roll out over the Atlantic. Again the visions of Challenger arose. Now the loudspeakers carried the voice of Mission Control in Houston...
...delight of the approxiamtely 250,000people gathered on river banks and highways and anecstatic NASA team in Launch Control, Discoverylifted off its seaside pad and streaked intocloudy skies. It remained in view less than a halfminute, but the tension was considerable and thesight was unforgettable...
...four-day Discovery mission will be the first shuttle flight since Challenger exploded in a fireball 73 seconds after liftoff from the same launch pad on Jan. 28, 1986. The accident ceded manned space to the Soviet Union, which has put 16 cosmonauts into orbit since then, aboard six flights...
...full stop, thus boosting a runway's capacity. The FAA is exploring the possibility of opening military airfields for civilian use, among them El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, near Los Angeles. Boeing and Bell Helicopter are developing aircraft that can take off vertically from a landing pad, then fly like an airplane on trips of up to 300 miles...