STS-123 Takes Off into the Night

Around 2:00am, we settle down on the bleachers. Three female astronauts are on hand to give us updates and take questions. Two have gone up before, another will go in the future.

There are less than a couple hundred of us on the bleachers. Thank goodness that the cold weather and wind from the weekend were gone. We are told that the astronauts have been on a modified time schedule for several weeks to accommodate the night launch. They woke up at 5:30pm, and had lunch at 9:00pm. Around 10:30, they get ready for launch, and get strapped in a couple of hours before launch.

Both the commander and pilot are trained to flew the Endeavor. The other astronauts are there to set up the Kibo experiment module and conduct experiments in space. In the event of a problem, Endeavor will not launch. In the event of a problem after launch, usually within two minutes after takeoff, Endeavor will come back to KSC, which is why good weather is so important. The commander and pilot need visibility to bring the Endeavor back to earth and KSC.

After holding for a while, the countdown clock starting counting down at T -9:00. This time, the countdown was for real. We got to two minutes and we knew the launch was going to happen. Updates from mission control are now frequent. We even got to participate in the countdown, and it was cool to say 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 and know that we were counting down to an actual rocket launch!

At T-0, the rockets started, the launch area got very bright, almost like daylight. A few seconds later, Endeavor blasted off into the air, creating a thick cloud of smoke and steam in its trail. The sound was not as loud as we expected, but you could definitely feel the rumbling from 3.5 miles away (the Vertical Assembling Building is 3 miles away; we were as close as civilians can get). We quickly lost sight of Endeavor because of the clouds, but we continued to get updates from mission control until about 10 minutes after launch.

Wow, you wait hours and hours for the launch, and then the launch happens in just a few seconds. But it was all worth it. A night launch is certainly spectacular. Yes, you actually get a better view on CNN, but you don't get the ambiance, the updates from the astronauts, the enthusiasm of the volunteers, and the actual knowledge that you are just a few miles from the actual event. Wow.

After 10 minutes, we were hustled back to the buses because an acid rain cloud was expected at T +28:00. The acid rain is created by the chemicals used at launch. It's not going to kill you, but it will irritate your skin. So we got on the buses, and headed back to Kiwanis Island to get into our cars. We said good-bye to Maki's parents and brother at Kiwanis, since our flight back to VA was the next morning.

Would I recommend a visit to Kennedy Space Center? Absolutely. It's about 30-45 minutes from Orlando airport and Disneyland and there are dozens of viewing areas from the so-called space coast (you don't have to have an invitation from an astronaut).