Discovery is home to stay

[robkelk]

Am I the only one who finds this photo to be bitter-sweet?

She's home safely... but she's never going to fly again...
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[Bob Schroeck]

No, you're not alone.

I'm afraid that it's the first photo from the ending of an era -- that of American manned space flight.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[Logan Darklighter]

Yes. American Manned Space Flight is over.
Not... quite. Let's amend that phrase a bit shall we?
Manned Space Flight by the United States of America National Aeronautics and Space Administration N.A.S.A. is over.
The NASA era in manned space flight is over.
We will never again likely have the national will to fund a manned space program through the government and through NASA. This era is over.
But...
You might be interested to know that we have a new space age beginning. And it's not a fenspace dream. Have a look at this -

NASA may have lost its way, but out under the radar America has a bold,
imaginative, successful and efficient Private Space Age starting to
bloom. Find out what's wrong with the current state of big-government,
manned space exploration, how to fix it, and what private property is
actually flying in space above your heads RIGHT NOW.

It might be a bit over the top in places, but Bill Whittle makes some excellent points and his optimism is infectious.
(Direct links provided above in case embedding doesn't work.)

[Honorbridge]

Well, not quite the end of US manned space flight - Endeavour still has a flight planned.  But that one should be the last, so the beginning of the end at the very least.  And yeah, Discovery's done.
When you think of all the advances space flight pushed us to achieve in the last 50+ years, it makes one wonder how much further we could have gone.

[ECSNorway]

It's still the end of an era.

And here's what really makes it bittersweet. The shuttle was supposed to make space travel cheap and easy compared to previous efforts.

With the upcoming Endeavor mission, we will have had 134 shuttle flights, from six craft. That's an average of barely more than 22 per ship.

Twenty-two missions. For how many billions of dollars each?

At this point the construction of the ship has become a rather small part of the per-mission cost. Which is kind of the point, I'll admit, of the program. But until we can reduce the other costs to a manageable level, space travel will remain an extravagance. I wish all good fortune to the groups planning private space programs... and continue to hold out hope for the future.

For this adventure never will be finished
We'll make up for the spine the others lack
Take it money, lives, or pain,
What we once won we will reclaim
We're goin' back, I swear to God,
We're goin' back!

-- Duane Elms, We're Going Back
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.