At his first news briefing in Houston, Texas, where the astronaut is undergoing rehabilitation, Cmdr Hadfield described the physical sensations of being in space and landing on Earth.
To estimate the latter, one needs to know what fraction of the impactor was distributed globally, as opposed to being ejected to space or landing close to the crater.
The airport is used by the American space agency Nasa as a contingency landing place for its space shuttles.
After 25 years, 32 successful missions, and more than 120-million miles traveled, space shuttle Atlantis made what's likely to be its last landing yesterday at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
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Of course none of those guys are named LeBron James, Dwyane Wade or Chris Bosh which was the goal these past two years as the team furiously cleared cap space in hopes of landing multiple big-time free agents.
After jetting 12, 000 mph to the edge of the planet's atmosphere, the seven-seater SpaceShipTwo will enter space for 15 minutes before landing a few hours later at a New Mexico spaceport.
"Together, we proved that a human in freefall can break the speed of sound returning from near space, going through a transonic phase and landing safely on the ground, " said Dr Jonathan Clark, a former space shuttle flight surgeon and the Red Bull Stratos medical director.
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Astronauts were told to prepare for landing at the Kennedy Space Center as early as 7:34 a.m.
Steady electronic "heartbeat" tones relayed from Curiosity across space to Earth indicated a successful landing to the control room at Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Passing over the landing site early Monday, the space agency's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured a dramatic image of Curiosity plunging toward the surface, dangling from its fully deployed, 51-foot-wide parachute.
The landing marks the end of the Space Shuttle Program, a program which conducted cutting-edge research for NASA for 30 years and built the largest structure in space, the International Space Station.
"We're about to start a major project with the UK Space Agency, putting our sensors onto things like landing vehicles for the Mars rover, " Mr Howard said.
The rover was scheduled to touch down in less than forty-eight hours, after the most complex and technically daring landing sequence in the history of the space program.
The "car-sized" rover, set to touchdown on August 5th of this year at 10:31PM PDT, is currently journeying towards the Red Planet on a suicide mission of sorts, with the success of its make it or break it EDL (enter, descent, landing) wracking the nerves of our Space Agency's greatest minds in advance.
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Then, some of those who once watched Columbia's perfect landing might experience the thrill of going into space for themselves.
The astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery today used a computer simulator to practice landing in preparation for their planned return to Earth tomorrow.
While the Nets have glitz, they don't have much salary cap space, meaning their job is far from a perfect landing spot for a big name.
Mr Heatherwick's future projects include the world's first all-glass bridge, and a public square in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, which will take the dramatic and humorous appearance of a gigantic, electric-blue carpet landing, as it were, from outer space.
NASA, America's space agency, is carrying out before sending a series of unmanned landing craft there.
"It's a big bet, with a risky landing method and no back-up, " said space analyst Howard McCurdy at American University.
The U.S. perfect it with putting a man on the man, then with a series of modern high tech space shuttle missions and Mars ROVERS. But now, the final frontier captains are more likely to be Russians, with their hopes for a human Mars landing someday, or Chinese, with a new China space station due within the next 8 years.
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Hernandez will serve as Discovery's flight engineer for launch and landing, and will wield robotic arms on the shuttle and space station.
Unsettled weather at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida prompted NASA to call off today's planned landing, and the shuttle's orbit will not allow another landing attempt in Florida until tomorrow morning.
The landing marked the end of the first private flight ever to the International Space Station.
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"This is the most challenging landing we have ever attempted, " said Doug McCuistion, director of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Mars exploration program.
The Osprey, readers of this space will recall, is a remarkable "tilt-rotor" airplane, capable of taking off and landing vertically but able to rotate its turboprop engines in flight so as to fly like a conventional aircraft.
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