Earthly Space Adventure

I’m sure you’re aware that the space shuttle was transported on the back of a 747 to DC this week. You probably weren’t aware of the anticipation we had for weeks leading up to the event. David loves space. Both of us have had dreams of being astronauts. His dreams continue, mine were crushed when the mean mom running the Young Astronauts club at my elementary school told me that my reflexes weren’t fast enough for NASA. Well, screw her, I was still excited.

We have a favorite spot along the Potomac for watching airplanes, and we got in the car to drive there for a space shuttle sighting. But along our way, right as we were approaching the Lincoln Memorial, the space shuttle crossed the sky in front of us! It’s a miracle we didn’t crash. So, we quickly changed our viewing plans.

Instead of joining the people lining the bridges into Virgina, we found a makeshift parking space in a field behind the Lincoln. We hopped out of the car, and joined the Park Police-woman on horseback to stand open-mouthed under the next two flyovers.

The plane was low enough for us to read the writing on its tail. It was low enough for us to hear its roar in our ears. I don’t think it was close enough to feel its vibrations in my chest, but I might have been distracted. What a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. We were very lucky to stumble across the perfect viewing spot, and I feel very lucky to have witnessed something so impressive and unusual. Thanks, NASA!

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Comments

Earthly Space Adventure — 3 Comments

  1. wow! my dad works in aerospace and im sure he would have loved to see this first hand. Definitely a once in a lifetime event!

  2. I’m so jealous..I lived in Florida for 25 years and loved to see the shuttles and rockets go up. Now I live in Washington state and was sad I was not able to see this shuttle off.

Leave a Reply to kim Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.