White Sands In Space - A White Sands National Park Story

[Transcript]

Okay, now that we're back on the highway, let me share one last story and then I'll bid you farewell with some parting thoughts and a pretty fantastic song. 

Now, like I said before, these white gypsum sand dunes cover about 275 square miles, and at that size and with that bright white color, the dunes are easily visible from space and that's a good thing because for astronauts, finding white sands could come in handy, which reminds me of a pretty stellar story. 

You see, over on White Sands Missile Range is a designated runway for space shuttles and one time in 1982, the shuttle Columbia was returning from orbit. 

Its destination was Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California, but poor weather made the runways too soggy for a shuttle landing, so Columbia was rerouted right here to White Sands and the shuttle made a successful landing on the missile range. 

Years later, astronauts claimed that they could still find white gypsum sand inside the shuttle. Now, the space shuttle program ended back in 2011, but the missile range continues to be a testing facility for rocket engines and space technology.