Shuttle Update

Andy Borowitz reports:

In an abrupt change in mission, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration announced today that the space shuttle Discovery would not be launched as originally planned and that the shuttle astronauts would instead "explore the areas in and around Cape Canaveral, Florida."

To many in the scientific community, the decision to keep the space shuttle on the ground and employ the astronauts to explore Cape Canaveral was regarded as a loss of nerve on the part of the nation's space agency.

But according to NASA spokesman Carlos Lessac, the plan to explore Cape Canaveral had been in the works for months: "We believe that our brave astronauts can tell us much about how Cape Canaveral got here, and in so doing, will offer up some clues as to how the universe itself was created."

"The team of astronauts will spend the next several weeks taking soil samples from various front lawns and back yards in Cape Canaveral, as well as performing scientific tests on the atmosphere and water, Mr. Lessac said.

"We know that Cape Canaveral can support life, but the question is, how?" he said. "This is just one of many mysteries our team of astronauts hopes to probe."

Mr. Lessac added that the decision to explore Cape Canaveral rather than outer space should not be seen as a scaling back of the space agency's ambitions.

"Today, Cape Canaveral," he said. "Tomorrow, Orlando."