Blast-Off Discovery!!

As I have mentioned before, there was a time when I wanted to be an astronaut.  Since we live in an area with a NASA channel, I have the opportunity to see the inner workings of NASA, space missions, etc.  Most of the time, it's like watching CSPAN-very dry and boring.  However, when I was younger and wanted to be an astronaut, I would have sat and watched this channel for hours.

Today, Doug texted me and asked me if I was planning on watching space shuttle Discovery's launch.  My reply was "How do I have a husband working at NASA and knew nothing of a shuttle launch?"  Anyway, today was the (for the time being) second to last space shuttle launch and the last launch of Discovery.  I also saw this as an opportunity to let Weston see the sort of thing that Daddy works with all day.  Obviously, he's too young to understand or care, but it made me feel sort of "teacherly" exposing my son to something educational.

I put the NASA channel on and went about my business, feeding and playing with Weston, entertaining the dogs, etc.  We saw the astronauts getting ready to go into the shuttle via the "clean room".  We saw the NASA workers getting the commander situated in his seat inside the shuttle.  Eventually, after thinking the flight may be scrapped for today, we watched Discovery leave the Earth's atmosphere. 

Because of the Columbia incident, NASA put cameras on the external fuel tank, which allows the engineers to monitor the launch and ensure that nothing falls off of the shuttle, causing damage.  During Columbia's launch, foam fell off the shuttle, damaging it, and thus causing it to disintegrate upon re-entry.  Since there were cameras on Discovery's launch as well, today we were able to watch as the booster rockets and external fuel tank fell off of the shuttle.

It was very cool to watch the shuttle enter orbit.  They were travelling so fast that they were far above the Earth in just moments.  Again, if I was still as interested in the space program as I was 15 years ago, I would have been in 7th heaven today.