Anyone keep up with NASA? Ready for launch?

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I live in the desert in Southern CA. We never see lift off, but we have MANY times seen the landing at Edwards. Ken is known to throw clothes at me at 3 am and holler ITS LANDING AT EDWARDS..... Off we go.....
 
When I lived in So. Cal (LA Basin) I would always get the "stuff" scared outta me with those sonic booms!!! One time after the Northridge earthquake (I was living in Northridge at that time too) I could've sworn it was another quake and my apartment building was coming down around me!!!


Well.. today's test launch is SCRUBBED!
Try again tomorrow
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This shows my age but..... does anybody remember back in the mid to late 60's when the USAF used to do fly overs around the country. I remember in school they took all the kids out to the playground and there was a high flying plane going supersonic. It was high but you could still hear the sonic boom. Then the principle read a piece from the newspaper about how the USAF was protecting the USA from the evils of communism etc etc. I remember the school was an air raid shelter as well, it had the civil defense signs all over.

When I lived in Virgina Beach, VA you could hear them out over the ocean all the time, they had to be a certain distance off shore before they could go supersonic.

Steve in NC
 
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Steve_of_sandspoultry wrote: Then the principle read a piece from the newspaper about how the USAF was protecting the USA from the evils of communism etc etc.

Pop was stationed at Norton AFB (SBAMA) and at March AFB (SAC) from `58-`66. He'd know when exercises were scheduled. He'd drive us to the vicinity, put my brothers and I on top of the station wagon and the sound of the`52's rising into the night sky would cause my body to resonate like a bowl of jello. I had my own little dog tags (goverment issue) one for the `count', one for Graves Registry.

The folks would sit up and watch the black and white feed from the cape as the unmanned pre-Mercury tests were sometimes broadcast live (didn't always turn out so well) and the launch `holds' were often so long that when I'd wake up and wander `round I'd take a seat between them on the couch and be the only one watching the `test pattern' as they'd be sound asleep.

Sure wish we'd skipped `chemical' fueled vehicles altogether: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)

If it hadn't been for the `hysteria' in this nation after the launch of Sputnik, I'd not have spent the majority of my summers (grades 1-5) in voluntary summer school (thank goodness for the Comrades at Tyuratam).

I, for one, am very nervous about not keeping the shuttle fleet funded: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/mar/31/space-mission-russia-us

Need a 24/7 live HD feed from camera pointed back at earth (at least I'd be able to drift off to sleep imagining it is as peaceful as it looks from low orbit).

ed:sp​
 
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Interesting times back then to be sure. I was born in Oct of 1962 and my mom told me they weren't sure if I would make it to be a month old. (for all you "youngsters"
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Cuban missle crisis)

I don't remember Mercury but I remember everybody being glued to the TV for Apollo.

Steve
 
I grew up in Brevard county (where Cape Canaveral is) and remember a lot of the early space program. I saw all of the manned Apollo launches, the early shuttle launches, astronauts used to come to our schools and all that. We've lost an entire generation of progress in space exploration since then. I have great hopes for the new program that has been proposed, but as they are ever at the mercy of congress I fully expect them to botch it all up beyond recognition just as they've done with NASA for the last forty years.

If you ever find yourself in Central Florida I highly recommend visiting the Space Center. There is a LOT there for anyone interested in the field. It takes more than a full day to see everything if you include the bus tours and I would definitely not miss them!

It's a federal installation so you'll have to go through security like going into an airport to get inside. I always have to go through my pockets before we leave the car.

.....Alan.
 
Liftoff was BEAUTIFUL!!!!! Total success!!!!!

YAY ARES!

A.T. your right, the Space Center at the Cape is definitely worth seeing. I've been a few times before and it really is awe inspiring.

I still hope to go to Space Camp... a teacher friend of mine got to go on a Teacher's trip and she ran Cap Comm... how fun for her.
 
I love it we watch from our front lawn..My uncle worked on the shuttle for many years.. And we sometimes sit on his dock and watch it..AWSOME!!! I love the night launches!!
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Liftoff! The Ares I-X Flight Test Begins
Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:30:38 AM EDT

Rising into the Florida sky, the 327-foot rocket thunders away from the launch pad, marking the first time a new vehicle has launched from the complex since the first space shuttle launch in 1981.

The mission will last two minutes, during which constant data received from the rocket.

At about the T+2 minute point in the flight, the upper stage simulator and first stage will separate at approximately 130,000 feet over the Atlantic Ocean. The unpowered simulator will splash down in the ocean. The first stage will be fired for a controlled ocean landing with parachutes that will allow recovery by one of NASA's booster recovery ships, while the other ship tracks the upper stage.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/constellation/ares/flighttests/aresIx/index.html
 

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