Mercury up close and personal thanks to Messenger this week on planetary radio. Hi everyone, welcome to Public Radio's travel show that takes you to the final frontier.

I'm Mad Kaplan. Messenger Mission Leader Sean Solomon is

back. We last talked to him just before his spacecraft reached our solar

systems innermost planet. Now he'll share some of what we have already learned from that first

thrilling fly-by of Mercury in more than 30 years. But that's not all. We're just around the corner

from another Bill Nye commentary,

this time on the current mission of space shuttle Atlantis,

delivering a package from Europe to the International Space Station.

And Bruce Pats will prepare us for a total lunar eclipse that is just days away.

He's on top of a lot more going on in the night sky this week,

and he'll help me give away another planetary radio t-shirt in our weekly space trivia contest.

Emily Lochuwala is off this week.

She'll be back with a brand new Q&A segment next time.

Speaking of Atlantis.

B minus 10, 9, 8, go for main engine start,

7, 6, main engine ignition, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Zero and lift-off of Space Shuttle Atlantis as Columbus sets sail a voyage of science to the space

station.

The shuttle made it off the pad on Thursday, February 7th.

As we put this week's show to bed, Atlantis had docked at the International Space Station,

and astronauts were preparing for a delayed first spacewalk.

That delay is something of a mystery. NASA spokespeople admit that a crew

...