Obamas to Attend Final Shuttle Launch (may be joining Rep. Gabrielle Giffords)

[babylonsister]

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/20/obamas-to-attend-shuttle-launch/

Obamas to Attend Shuttle Launch
By JACKIE CALMES


3:22 p.m. | Updated President Obama and his family will attend the final launch on April 29 of the space shuttle Endeavour, and perhaps join Representative Gabrielle Giffords if she is able to watch as her astronaut-husband, Mark E. Kelly, leads the mission into space, administration officials confirmed on Wednesday.

Ms. Giffords, the Democratic congresswoman from Tucson who suffered a brain injury in the shootings there on Jan. 8, is hoping to be on hand, friends and staff have said. Her husband is the commander of the shuttle mission, which leaves from Cape Canaveral, Fla. She has been receiving rehabilitative therapy in Houston.

Presidents have rarely been on hand for shuttle launches. But the Tucson shootings, which killed six people and wounded 13, seized the nation’s attention for weeks, especially as Ms.Giffords,defied the odds to survive the head injury and begin a slow recovery. Also, Florida is a swing state important to Mr. Obama’s re-election hopes next year.

Update: External events have foiled or interrupted the Obama family’s getaways before, and space launch dates are often scrubbed due to weather or technology problems, sometimes moments before the scheduled lift-off. The space agency also is sensitive to avoiding deadline pressures; those were identified as factors in the losses of the shuttles Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003, with the 14 astronauts aboard them.

[shireen]

1. shuttle launches are wonderful

Seen two. Awesome amazing sight!

i bet the Obamas will get a real kick out of it, especially the girls.

Sad, tho' ... end of an era. They were not the best in space transportation, but they sure were cool. I'll miss them.