[meteorite-list] NASA Stardust Capsule To Go On Display At Smithsonian

[Ron Baalke]

Sept. 25, 2008

Dwayne Brown 
Headquarters, Washington 
202-358-1726 
dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov 

William P. Jeffs 
Johnson Space Center, Houston 
281-483-5111 
william.p.jeffs at nasa.gov 

D.C. Agle 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
818-393-9011 
agle at jpl.nasa.gov 

RELEASE: 08-245

NASA STARDUST CAPSULE TO GO ON DISPLAY AT SMITHSONIAN

WASHINGTON -- Having returned the world's first particles from a 
comet, NASA's Stardust sample return capsule will join the collection 
of flight icons in the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum in 
Washington. The capsule will go on public display in the museum's 
Milestones of Flight Gallery on Oct. 1, the 50th anniversary of NASA. 

Stardust, comprising a spacecraft and capsule, completed a seven-year, 
3-billion-mile journey in 2006. A tennis racket-like, aerogel-lined 
collector was extended to capture particles as the spacecraft flew 
within 150 miles of comet Wild 2 in January 2004. Carrying the 
collected particles, the capsule returned to Earth Jan. 15, 2006, 
landing in Utah. Two days later, it was transported to a curatorial 
facility at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. 

"Very few people get to build something, launch it into space, see it 
be successful and then get it back in their hands," said Karen 
McNamara, Johnson recovery lead for the Stardust mission. "To be able 
to share this with the public is phenomenal." 

The capsule joins the Wright brothers' 1903 Flyer, Charles Lindbergh's 
Spirit of St. Louis and the Apollo 11 command module Columbia that 
carried the first men to walk on the moon. 

"The Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum is 
delighted to add to the National Collection the Stardust return 
capsule," said Roger Launius, senior curator of the Division of Space 
History at the museum. "As one of the premier space science missions 
of the recent past, Stardust will take its place alongside other 
iconic objects from the history of air and spaceflight. I look 
forward to helping to impart more knowledge to our visitors about the 
makeup of the universe using this significant and path breaking 
object." 

Hardware provided to the Smithsonian includes actual flight 
components. Elements relevant to the science goals of the mission 
remain with NASA. 

After successfully completing its mission, Stardust will use its 
flight-proven hardware to perform a new, previously unplanned 
investigation. The mission, called Stardust-NExT, will revisit comet 
9P/Tempel 1. This investigation will provide the first look at the 
changes to a comet nucleus produced after a close approach to the 
sun. It also will mark the first time a comet ever has been 
revisited. 

"Usually, when a piece of your spacecraft goes into the Smithsonian 
that means the mission's over," said Stardust-NExT project manager 
Rick Grammier, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, 
Calif. "But the Stardust spacecraft is still doing the job for NASA 
and in February 2011, it will fly within 120 miles of the comet." 

Stardust is a low-cost, Discovery Program mission for NASA's Science 
Mission Directorate. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory manages the 
project. Joseph Veverka of Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., is the 
mission's principal investigator. Lockheed Martin Space Systems of 
Denver manages mission operations. 

For information about the Stardust mission on the Web, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/stardust 

Images of the Stardust capsule being prepared for shipment can be 
found at: 

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/home/stardust.html 


NASA Television will air Video File material to illustrate this story. 
For NASA TV downlink, schedule and streaming video information, 
visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv 

	
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