Every day, creative professionals bring something unique and different into the world. A large—and growing—number of these use OWC products as part of their workflow.
Over the last year or so, we’ve mentioned our friends at The Last Shuttle Project, who are documenting the end of the Space Shuttle era. Creator and president Dennis Biela came in to talk to us about the Last Shuttle Project, what they’re doing, and how OWC fits into their workflow.
A little more than a month ago, the final landing of Space Shuttle Atlantis marked the end of the Space Shuttle program. We followed the story pretty closely here on the OWC Blog, mostly in relation to our friends over at The Last Shuttle Project. Well, now we have a nice little postscript to the saga.
On Monday, Aug. 15, the eighth batch of artifacts from NASA’s various programs were made available on a website that the agency and the General Services Administration (GSA) developed.
This batch of artifacts not only included items from the Space Shuttle program, but the Apollo, Mercury, and Hubble Space Telescope programs as well.
To date, approximately 29,000 items of historic significance have been offered, mainly from the shuttle, with contributions from the Hubble, Apollo, Mercury, Gemini, and International Space Station programs. Approximately 3,000 artifacts have been requested. The remainder will be considered for federal and state reuse and then offered to the general public for sale.
For more information about these artifacts and how they’re distributed, you may want to check out the NASA Artifact site; there’s a lot more information there.
Last week saw the end of the landing of the final Space Shuttle mission, bringing to close an era in space exploration. We’ve followed this story (and various tangents) for the better part of a year. In the process, we’ve sponsored and have made friends with the Last Shuttle Project in an effort to do our part to help preserve the history of this long running and important program.
We’re glad to say OWC was there ‘til the very end; OWC Founder and CEO Larry O’Connor flew down to watch the shuttle land with some of the crew of the Last Shuttle Project. “I’m honored to have had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to witness this historic landing,” he said, reflecting on the event.
Below are a few images of the final event. Note: The last picture of the cockpit one requires a pair of red/cyan 3D glasses to view, but it’s well worth the effort to find a pair. You can see all the instrument displays and even the commemorative plaque on the center console. Article Continues…
Before I watched the Atlantis lift off on Friday, the last time I saw a Space Shuttle launch live as it happened was on a TV cart wheeled in to the classroom when I was in the fifth grade. It wasn’t a common happening – this was a special event… after all, there was a teacher going into space; I don’t think I have have to tell you what happened next…
While I retained a fascination with the space program, there were no more live launches broadcast at school, and as I grew older, the launches just became something that I was peripherally aware of.
More accurately, it was what they did on those missions that caught my attention: launching the Hubble Space Telescope, helping build the International Space Station, repairing the Hubble, cool things happening in Spacelab, and the like. Article Continues…
Amongst the collective weeping and gnashing of teeth over the difficulties replacing the 2011 iMac’s hard drive, it’s nice to hear that something is finally going well. After multiple delays, Space Shuttle Endeavor finally lifted off today at 7:56 AM CDT marking both its final flight and the second-to-last Space Shuttle mission.
Our friends with The Last Shuttle Project were there with their cameras and other equipment (undoubtedly including some OWC storage-related products) to capture it all. Here are a couple of low-resolutions shots of the Last Shuttle crew setting up their equipment and a rather unique road sign. Article Continues…