Last Monday, the Space Shuttle Endeavour lifted off to its last journey to Space, and on board she has a very special pay-load: a bunch of LEGO® kits.These are be the very first LEGO® kits that ever have travelled into space (there have been some pre-glued models so far only) as engineers were scared of loose parts floating around and getting sucked into the Shuttle's ventilation; Astronaut Cady Coleman (well-known for her recent ISS-Earth flute duet with Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson) will build some models from them in a clear glove box on board of the ISS in order to demonstrate to children the effects of zero gravity, both on single parts as well as on some simple LEGO® machines.
I'm looking forward to the videos!
The building instructions for these models will be available for download on LegoSpace.com so we earthlings can create them also on the ground.
Update 1: Joe Meno from Brickjournal hinted me to the fact that these are not the first LEGO® kits in space: on board of an earlier mission there were two CITY Space shuttle kits. However, the kits of the mission at hand will still be the first ones ever built in space.
Thanks, Joe!
Update 2: The information that all of the pre-built models that have been sent to Space so far have been glued seems to be unconfirmed also. Does any of our readers have additional knowledge about that fact? If so, please tell us.
3 comments:
When a pre-build model goes into space, what happens with the air-pockets inside the model during take-off? Will the lower pressure cause the model to fall apart?
And when you put it together in a low-pressure aircraft, can you open it once your back on the ground?
No, the cabin of the Shuttle and ISS are basically at surface pressure (A little higher like aircraft though)
Even if Lego was subjectted to a vacuum, the gaps between the bricks would allow the air to escape. As Lego depends on friction and not air pressure, they should not fall apart or be unable to open them.
nope the ev3 is not the next step, maybe a bad step backwards but otherwise even with teh wifi and sd card it still isn't nowhere as good as all the NXT 2 stuff
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