Launch at Cape Kennedy

[HawkerHurricane]

Launch

Okay, you've probably seen film or video footage on TV. But if you haven't been to a launch, at least as close as the thousands of cars stacked up back out on the highway, you just don't know anything about it.

At first the world is nothing but horizon, endless ocean and sky, all of it still, tranquil, serene. Three-hundred-and-sixty-degree Spielberg, rich and vivid. Lazy clouds overhead, a flight of birds just visible gliding low over marsh flats in the distance, a few boats out on the water. The stillness is not perfect - there is the countdown bellowing out of those superb speaker horns, and there is the internal thunder of elevated pulse - but basically the world is as it has always been: at rest, indifferent to anything any of the scurrying ants on its surface might come up with.

Then Hell breaks loose.
A dirty white explosion spreads in all directions. At its center, beneath the stacked array, a Beast is born. It is mighty. And angry. Its roar shatters the world, splits the sky, echoes up and down the Florida coast and miles out to sea. You thought you knew what to expect, but this is louder. The sound is tangible, hits you with physical force, vibrates up your legs from the ground beneath your feet, scares the living shit out of you. Your first thought is that you are witnessing a disaster even more awful than Challenger: an on-the-pad explosion.

Then the Beast's two big brothers wake up - the giant solid rocket boosters - and Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, and Limbo all break loose together and start to argue. The sound is indescribable, just short of unbearable. So insensate is the rage of this new Beast that the world itself will not have it. No matter that something the size and weight of an apartment building is sitting on its back: it lifts from the ground on a raving column of its own fury and rises impossibly into the air, becomes a thick growing tower of white smoke, the 128-ton Shuttle stack balanced on top like a Ping-Pong ball on the stream from a fire hose. The bonds of Earth can be as surly as they like: the Beast is surlier, shrugs its terrible shoulders, and slips them clean.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

[Dogmudgeon]

1. That's a good excerpt

However, it's way too long to post here. The standard is "four paragraphs and a link". In this case, a link to Amazon.com or BandN.com might be more appropriate.

Thanks!

BareKnuckledLiberal
DU Moderator

[Rick Myers]

2. That's NO joke!

I was at the launch of STS-26, the FIRST after Challenger. We were in the VIP area about 4.7 miles from the pad.

There is NOTHING like it! I only wish I'd experienced a Saturn 5 launch!

The shuttle is Man harnessing the Might of God!!!

[HawkerHurricane]

3. The discription if from STS-29

I can't claim anything grander than a SM1 Standard myself.

[moof]

5. 4.7 miles v the 6.5 out to the regular gallery is the difference between

night and day then. Watched a night launch from the viewing area serviced by the bus and that was very disappointing. It was a calm night and if not for the lighting up of the area as if the sun had come up for a few seconds the whole thing would have been a loss.
There was some sound but very little and if the ground shook any it was not perceptable. Not to be a wet blanket, everyone should see one if possible but by all means if there is any way see it from the VIP area. All you need is to know someone that knows one of the crew. At least it was that way before 9/11.

[northofdenali]

4. I was raised (from age 4 on) in Merritt Island.

Pre-KSC, Cape Canaveral, daddy was a button-pusher in a blockhouse for launches. I met Glenn and all the original Magnificent 7, was able to attend a few launch parties and dinners. We could watch the launches from our back yard in north Merritt Island, and got to do the driving tour of KSC the first few days after it opened.

Then I saw the only nighttime moon shot while in a catamaran anchored across from the VAB in the Indian River.

Shuttles are awesome, as well. While visiting a few years ago, my husband could not leave the camera alone when a shot was coming up. We'd hear the rumble from the Florida Room in mom's house, dash out back and he'd click away.

Whoever has the chance to view a launch, go for it. Also go out to KSC and tour the Space Art, the Missile Garden and take the bus tour of the base. It's pretty awesome, especially the VAB. I worked there during college as a tour guide in summers.

Thanks for the memories, Hawker. :hug:

[Ready4Change]

6. That all may change June 21st, 2004.

Glorious discription, and I've always wanted to go see a launch on the cape.

But on June 21st (this month!) a new era in space exploration may begin. Here's a link:

http://www.scaled.com/projects/tierone/index.htm