So here's a bonus about living in Orlando. Naturally, you are close to cool theme parks. And you can drive east 45 minutes and hit a beach on the Atlantic Ocean. But! The really awesome part is that you can see shuttle launches from your own neighborhood!
Here's the story: On Friday, Nov 14th Space Shuttle Endeavor was scheduled to do a nighttime launch. It was the last nighttime launch of 2008. Josh and I were debating if we should go. We learned about it too late and so all the tickets for normal viewing were sold out. The newspapers said you can park along the highway to watch, but come 4 hours early. We didn't think that was feasible for the kids. So we thought, okay, we'll watch for another launch next year and get tickets for it.
Later that night, we are driving home from the store. It's Friday night and I look at the clock and see that it is 7:54pm. I thought, hey! the launch is going off in 1 minute. I wonder if we'll see it? Which way is due East? So, the whole family is in the car, scanning the skies. Finally, Josh pulls over into the neighborhood next to ours and is driving along a golf course. All the sudden, I shout, "There it is! Pull over!" There is this incredibly bright column of fire shooting up into the sky. I yank Noah out of his carseat and Josh (luckily) has his videocam in the back. We were able to watch the shuttle for a good 5 minutes. It was absolutely incredible.
BTW, did you know that when viewing a shuttle launch, it doesn't go straight up like a 90degree angle? It was going off to the left like an arc. I am thinking that has to do with the arc of the earth. Perhaps, Sean or Katie can enlighten me?
Here's a link to see our video!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1680587728022731080&hl=en
4 comments:
Loved the video, you all sound very excited
How is it that I never commented on this post? What an awesome treat! I'll have to ask Sean about the curvature of the shuttle path, I'm SURE he'll know. (everytime I say that, I'm secretly hoping he doesn't know and then I know he's actually human)
That is too cool! I've always wanted to see a shuttle launch, and now I have! I don't know why Katie's always hoping for me to be wrong, it's never going to happen. I think it flies sideways to build up orbital speed, otherwise it would just slow down and fall back to earth. It's a potential energy thing.
Flies sideways??? Methinks not!
I think since we were 60 miles away, we were able to see the arc of the earth better. Those who were 5-10 miles away would perceive the shuttle to go more at a 90 and then probably a more 45 degree angle as it went further away. This is called the Jenny Theory. Check it out.
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