Were on a mission…

When the space shuttle is prepared for a mission, there is a ton of planning. Lots of people are involved. There’s a heavy investment of time, money, and Human Resources. And there’s equipment of course — without the structure and equipment of a shuttle, you aren’t going anywhere after all.

The shuttle takes off and it’s a beautiful sight. Attached to the shuttle is the external tank holding tons of fuel needed for the take off and pulling away from the gravitational pull of the earth. And the booster rockets. There are literally rocket scientists who study this stuff and dedicate their whole lives to the missions of the space shuttle.

Once the shuttle takes off and reaches a certain altitude, the rocket boosters separate from the shuttle. According to NASA’s website, they are jettisoned and fall back to the earth so they can be assessed and reused if possible.

The External Tank stays on longer until it is just about empty, helping the shuttle finish breaking through the rest of the gravitational pull and when it has served it’s purpose, it is then jettisoned at a “preplanned trajectory” where it burns up in the atmosphere. It isn’t reusable, apparently.

The jettisoning of the boosters and the external tank are important so that the shuttle can complete its mission. The boosters and the external tank did their job — they fulfilled their purpose. They were good. And when they had fulfilled their purpose, they were let go of because if they had been held onto longer, they would have put the entire…