How the Space Shuttle Endeavour got Her British Name

How many times has this happened to you? You're writing an article, or a blog entry, or a tweet about the space shuttle that is on her way home from her final flight as the STS-134 mission comes to an end. Next thing you know, you've typed the name "Endeavor", instead of "Endeavour". "Damn autocorrect" usually gets you through the moment. For those of you in the UK, this has never been a problem, but here across the pond, it's been a recurring experience for the last 15 days.

But did you ever wonder why NASA's fifth orbiting space shuttle acquired her name with the British spelling? 10 seconds of research on this topic lead me to the orbiter information page on the NASA Kennedy Space Center website. And therein lies the answer:

NASA's Endeavour was named for the HMS Endeavour:

"Endeavour was named after a ship chartered to traverse the South Pacific in 1768 and captained by 18th century British explorer James Cook, an experienced seaman, navigator and amateur astronomer. He commanded a crew of 93 men, including 11 scientists and artists.

"Cook's main objective, tasked by the British Admiralty and the Royal Society, was to observe the Transit of Venus at Tahiti. This reading enabled astronomers to find the distance of the Sun from the Earth, which then could be used as a unit of measurement in calculating the parameters of the universe..."

149 million kilometers, or 93 million miles from Earth. This is equal to about eight light minutes, which is to say that it takes light eight minutes to travel from the surface of the Sun to Earth. The second planet from the Sun, just slightly less massive than Earth, and the closest planet to Earth, Venus is called Earth’s sister planet. Despite the proximity, due to the thick cloud layer in the Venusian atmosphere, humanity would know nothing about the environment at the surface of Venus until the advent of space probes in the middle of the 20th century. But the basics of her movement around the Sun, and the distances between the Sun, Venus, and Earth were worked out based on the measurements taken by the scientists on Cook’s voyage.

The NASA article goes on:

"Cook's achievements on Endeavour were numerous, including the accurate charting of New Zealand and Australia and successfully navigating the Great Barrier Reef. Thousands of new plant specimens and animal species were observed and illustrated on this maiden voyage. Cook also established the usefulness of including scientists on voyages of exploration."

So now we know. Time to add the British spelling to the computer's dictionary.