I just watched the Space Shuttle Endeavour night landing and was surprised to see what appeared to be an orange strobe light flashing at the base of the tail. I didn’t think the Shuttle had any sort of aircraft-style anti-collision light. The light looked weird for a aircraft light. It was orange and not on the belly or wingtips.

As the shuttle landed and left the glare of the intense xenon lights, the flashing turned out the be bursts of flame jetting straight upward along the tail. Since none of the NASA commentators Mission Control, or the astronauts seemed excited, I figured it was normal and finally they explained it. The jets of flame are the exhaust of the APUs (auxiliary power units) which power the hydraulics that move the Shuttles control surfaces. After landing, they need the hydraulics to put the main engines in a “rain drain” position so rainwater doesn’t pool in the engines. They also move the body flap on the bottom of the Shuttle. The flames are the exhaust of the APUs.

Having never seen a night landing, the APU flares were quite a surprise to me. It was a pretty spectacular landing and the flares made it look even cooler.

Also, I had to watch the landing online at NASA’s website. Most of the major networks only carried the last few seconds of the touchdown and Fox news was carrying it split screen with talking heads talking about clitorides while the shuttle landed. At least I can count on NASA TV to be G rated.

Technorati Tags: