Monday, May 16, 2011

The Space Shuttle

I was -25 years old when the first space shuttle launched.


Today I got to watch the second to the last Shuttle go into space, and the last flight for Space shuttle Endeavour.  I had to get up super early () to get to the place where the bus picked us up to transport us to the launch viewing area.  My grandpa is hooked up with all these NASA people, so he hooked us up with VIP tickets.  I took Obama’s seats!  I was at the closest point for non-muckidy mucks to view the shuttle launch.

The shuttle launched at May 16.  I was at the viewing site at .  I decided to celebrate by eating Cheetos and drinking orange soda.  There was a giant clock that was counting down the launch.  It stopped at 30 minutes and some NASA muckidy-mucks gave speeches.  Then, they did a count down to resume the count down clock!  That was crazy!  It was like an appetizer!  When the launch clock started again I cheered!  The NASA people had loud speakers set up for us to listen to mission control. 

I was so tired all I could eat were Cheetos.















When the clock hit :10 … everyone started to yell the count down… 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 …. I could see a large plume of smoke from the launch pad and then the shuttle blasting off.  The fire from the engines was so bright it you couldn’t look at it without squinting.  My dad said the brightness was like putting magnesium in water (for you science geeks).  There was NO SOUND!  Until about 10 seconds after the shuttle blasted off.  Suddenly there was a giant BOOMING sound.  It was like a sustained sonic boom.  I like to watch planes fly over Ashburn.  This was like 1,000 planes flying over.  I could even feel the air compression!

I loved it!  Then it was back on the bus to take a nap!

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