Saturday, November 10, 2007

NASA's Space Shuttle Cockpit

NASA's Space Shuttle, officially called Space Transportation System is the spacecraft currently used by the United States government for its human spaceflight missions. At launch, it consists of a rust-colored external tank (ET), two white, slender Solid Rocket Boostersorbiter, a winged spaceplane which is the space shuttle in the narrow sense.
During STS-101, Atlantis was the first shuttle to fly with a glass cockpit.

A glass cockpit is an aircraft cockpit that features electronic instrument displays. A relatively recent development, glass cockpits are highly sought-after upgrades from traditional cockpits. Where a traditional cockpit relies on numerous mechanical gauges to display information, a glass cockpit utilizes several computer displays that can be adjusted to display flight information as needed.