Summary

Description	MS. STILSON: Okay. The next question is from Jennifer in Green Bay. Why was the Space Shuttle Discovery chosen instead of Atlantis or Endeavour to fly in the Return to Flight mission? Is there something special pertaining to this Shuttle that it was chosen? MR. LYONS: Well, all the Shuttles are very similar, but there are some small differences. In this case, none of those differences were the deciding factor to fly Discovery first. As a matter of fact, Atlantis was first selected to fly first. But as we started understanding the modifications or changes that we were going to perform on the orbiters in order to make them more safe, it became clear that Discovery was the best orbiter to go implement those changes. So we decided -- we redirected our attention to Discovery, decided to fly Discovery first. And Atlantis will fly right after in September.
Date	2005-07-18
Source	images.nasa.gov

Licensing

Public Domain (US Government Work)