At the Visitors' Center is a 'rocket garden', an outdoor exhibit of some of the rockets used for Gemini, Mercury and Apollo missions. One of the most astonishing things to realize is the Cinderella dimensions of these space carriages. Some of those guys had to spend two weeks in the cosmos with barely enough room to stretch their toes. Heaven forbid that anyone should get a charley horse. And I get cabin fever just driving across Rhode Island! Another thing that came as quite a surprise was that some of the rocket engines ran on kerosene.
We took a bus tour to an observation gantry near several of the launch pads, at which we got a pretty close look, especially with the aid of binoculars. We also got a good look at the first alligator we ever saw in the wild, an 8-foot, breathing, slithering, chomping chunk of luggage sunning himself near a marsh as if waiting for another countdown. We pointed him out to one family who said, 'oh, we live here, so we see them all the time.' Not, I hope, in their back yard. (We later got much closer to another gator, about the same size, at the Visitors' Center. But this one obviously was planted there---the pond was surrounded by a fence.)
Another point on the bus tour that I found fascinating was the control room from which some flights were launched. (The Kennedy Space Center operates the liftoff, after which the Johnson Space Center near Houston takes control for the remainder of the mission.) The monitors depicted a simulated shuttle launch that was quite convincing, even to the point of having a red glow visible through the 'outside' windows.
In the same complex was displayed the actual rocket from one of the Apollo missions, stretched out so that you could walk under it with jaws agape. I wanted to take my time and admire it, but Kimberly was eager to catch the bus back to the main complex so Zephyr could attend a session to finish his requirements for his merit badge. Zephyr, being a budding video game designer, was just interested in studying the texture of the walls. So I decided we'd just have to come back another time, so I could finish gawking.
On the bus ride back, the driver pointed out a huge eagle's nest by the road that has been there for nearly 40 years---just about as long as the space program has been in existence. How's that for a fitting coincidence? The driver also pointed out the road that the shuttle travels from the enormous assembly/ maintenance facility to the launch pad and noted that they have to be extremely cautious in transporting it, because the insulation tiles are so fragile they hardly can be touched. How, I wondered, can human life be staked on such delicate contrivances?
Back at the Visitors' Center, Zephyr sat in on a rocketry workshop, which culminated in his making a paper rocket and launching it from a homemade launcher fashioned from a bicycle pump. On his initial attempt, the nose cone blew off. Just like the real thing, it took some trial and error, but on his second attempt he had a beautiful flight.
All that remained, besides collecting Zephyr's merit badge, was to load up on souvenirs in the gift ship. Kimberly bought a T-shirt with the Columbia emblem and the names of the astronauts on it. I bought a cap for my dad with the same thing on it, and a shuttle ink pen for my mom, who collects pens. And Zephyr bought a commemorative Columbia medallion.
Well, this was supposed to be a happy story with a happy ending, but of course it didn't turn out that way. On the morning of Feb. 1, at about the same time my parents were receiving their gifts in the mail, we were in a mall in Harrisonburg, Va. renting some Japanese DVD's for Zephyr, when I noticed that the television playing in the kiosk next to us was showing a special newsbulletin about some kind of explosion---which, the newscaster said, could be heard as far away as Louisiana. I watched, dumbstruck, as they continued the discussion---and showed pictures of the shuttle. OUR shuttle. Oh no, not again.
They must have known about the risks. Charlie Walker did. Every astronaut does. But risk apparently has become routine for them, just as watching a safe launch and return has become routine for us. There was one Challenger, and that, we figured, was that. Time after time, astronauts take humanity into space, and bring the cosmos back. Just like clockwork, from our perspective. Only this time, they didn't come back. The poem began to complete itself in my head pretty quickly, but it turned out to be rather a different piece from what I'd planned.
I am certain these fallen heroes would be aghast at the suggestion some have made, in the aftermath of this tragedy, that shuttle flights should be scrapped. Certainly, there are bugs to be worked out, and perhaps unmanned flights should take up the slack in the meantime. (Both NASA and George Bush received recent warnings that changes needed to be made, from a retired engineer who had worked for NASA for 36 years. Let's hope they're ready to listen now.)
But the notion that mankind doesn't belong in space appears especially absurd when one looks at history. The pioneers in covered wagons, the pilgrims on the Mayflower, the explorers of uncharted continents, the ascenders of mountains and the trekkers to arctic poles, all faced dangers far greater than the men and women who venture into space. They too were told that the risks were too great, that the undertaking was too costly, that there was nothing left to be discovered and no reason to seek anything, that their very aspirations violated God's will. But we are what we are because they did what they did. Who knows what the astronauts may help us achieve?
The world needs dreamers, and the world needs doers. These seven fearless souls were both, and we are all better off for it. My hat goes off to them, and my heart goes out to the ones they left earthbound.