In the Rain, Stewards of the Enterprise Can Keep it Dry, but Can't Catch a Cab Not even space agency bosses can catch a cab in Midtown Manhattan during a torrential thunderstorm and a cabbie shift change. Several officials from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration learned that lesson on Wednesday afternoon when they tried to leave the new space shuttle exhibit at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum on the West Side. Just as a press preview of the temporary home for Enterprise, the prototype for NASA's space shuttles, was wrapping up, thunder boomed overhead and winds whipped the giant tent inflated on the Intrepid's flight deck. Rainwater seeped under the tent as camera crews from television networks around the world filmed the Enterprise from all angles. The exhibit, which opens to the public on Thursday, lets visitors walk under the shuttle and climb a staircase for a nose-to-nose view. The museum is charging an additional $6 to buy passes, on top of the museum entry for adults of $24. Charles Bolden, the administrator of NASA, who awarded the Enterprise to the Intrepid, is expected to attend the opening ceremony on Thursday, along with several former astronauts and city officials. Mr. Bolden's deputy, Lori Garver, said Wednesday that she was pleased to see how the Enterprise was displayed in the enclosure, which was proving to be weatherproof as she spoke. "It's very important to NASA that it be special and Intrepid has helped make it that way," Ms. Garver said. So we're very pleased. Before she arrived, one of the Enterprise's test pilots, Fred W. Haise, recounted what it was like to steer back to earth a space shuttle that had no engine. "As a pilot, it was a great flying machine," said Mr. Haise, who was at the helm of Enterprise for five test flights in 1977. It had what we call good handling qualities. As for whether it belonged on a retired aircraft carrier tied up near the theater district and a block from a strip club, he said he had no objection. "Maybe it'll educate some of those people into leading a better life," Mr. Haise said with a grin. Museum officials expect to use the exhibit as a launching pad for a fund-raising campaign to pay for a permanent home for the Enterprise, either on the pier next to the carrier or across the West Side Highway. Susan Marenoff-Zausner, the museum's president, said she did not yet know how much money the museum's foundation would need to raise. For now, she said, "We feel very proud that we have excited the astronauts. That's not easy to do. Nor is catching cab at 5 p.m. in Midtown in a downpour. So Ms. Garver and her associates from NASA donned plastic ponchos and puddle-jumped along 46th Street toward their hotel.