Chronogamer - Shuttle

RSS Bot · July 7, 2006

Okay, this is definitely out of the chronology, but bear with me. I must rant.

I've wanted to see a Space Shuttle launch ever since I watched Columbia's first launch on TV when I was in the eighth grade in 1981.

However, I lived in Pennsylvania and later, Texas, and I never had the the time, money or circumstance to just take off and go see the space shuttle take off. Around 1993 I married, and my wife's family had property in Cocoa Beach where they "snow birded" every winter. We made an annual/biannual journey to spend time with them down there, but as coincidence failed to work out, we were never there during a launch.

This year, we were planning to be in Cocoa Beach during the end of June beginning of July. Perfect timing, potentially. However, at some point it was decided (not by me) that our visit wasn't necessary because my wife's parents (owners of the Florida property) were going to visit us instead. I was dissappointed, but decided that if I didn't say "let's go stay with your parents and see the space shuttle go" I might never see it happen (they'll all be retired by 2010 at the latest, I've heard). So, I resolutely asked my wife, who didn't think it was worth the drive, to support me in trying to accomplish a dream I'd failed to acheive in 25 years.

So, one 20-hour drive later, we're in Florida. Turns out that my brother-in-law and his wife have a fifth floor apartment in Cape Canaveral! They said they've watched things launch "all the time" and we were welcome to hang out and watch! Whoo-wee!

See, I'm there for myself, but I'm also there with my children, whom I really want to see a launch. I want them, 18 years or so from now, to be watching TV when we land on Mars and for them to be able to say, "this was important to our father, he took us to see the shuttle launch when we were young" or something like that. Yes, I'm a sentimentalist when it comes to space and my children, but I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.

So, Tuesday comes, the third launch attempt, and I'm very excited, not only because my kids and wife are with me, but we're five stories up and should have a good view of the launch. I read on the internet that the best non-ticketed views of the launch would be from the river, but if watching things launch from the balcony was a good enough view for my brother-in-law, who had seen at least a half a dozen launches, then it had to be good enough for me and my family.

Well, it wasn't. Not by a fucking longshot.

Okay, I'll admit, it was cool to some extent. Hearing the countdown on the TV, seeing the rockets ignite and then going out to the balcony to look for it to rise. However, my brother-in-law neglected to mention that to see it we had to lean over the balcony railing and peer north around the building. It came up from behind another building directly to the left of us, and dissapeared behind the overhanging roof of the building we were in. Total viewage: about two-and-a-half shuttle lengths during the slow early part of its ascent. There was no way my children could see it, because they weren't tall enough to lean over the railing, until it was just a white streak across the sky to the east with a little orange spark at the front.

Granted, there were people who came from all over the world to see the launch on Saturday and Sunday. This was their one shot in their lives to see it and the weather denied it to them. I'm 100% happier than those disappointed folk, but I'm angry as hell that I didn't go to the river in Titusville like I had originally intended.

The shuttle had launched slightly further left of where my brother-in-law had expected it to do so, but even his expected launch point would have been awful. He had decided that because my kids were with us (he has no children), that going to the river would've been a hassle. I'd driven 20 hours to see this with my kids! You'd think that would clue someone into the fact that "hassle" wasn't a problem! I'd fallen into the same trap I'd seen my wife and her sister fall into, trusting what this guy says because he sounds confident that he knows what he's talking about. I've warned them before to get second opinions and yet, I blindly trusted that this guy had a brain in his head for knowing what a good view of the launch was. Shame on me.

Maybe we'll drive down again in August. Shit, I'm still pissed off about this.

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