Andromeda

Almost as though Jed Clampett's truck had been shot into the sky, the space shuttle Discovery launched STS-114 into orbit, spattering critters and spewing debris. Today, they will use the new boom on the CanadaArm to search the nose and wings for damage, and hopefully scrape a possum out of the grill for granny's stew. In about a hundred flights, the shuttle has been hit by about 15,000 items of debris, so the chances of a catastrophe on re-entry seem minuscule, but public hue and cry about flight safety will likely lead to the crew holing up in the ISS until rescued by Atlantis, which will have lost even more of its thermal protection than Discovery and still land successfully on one wheel. The good news, from a science discovery perspective, as well as from a survival perspective, will be that Discovery will continue to encounter space "roadkill" even on orbit, and granny's famous "E.T. chitlins 'n' gravy" sits great on a space biscuit.