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While I was gone, they flew away

 
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GTG
Was lost but now am found




Joined: 30 Dec 2002
Posts: 2387
Location: Peoria, Arizona, originally from Rocket City, USA
PostPosted: 2/7/2003, 1:03 am    Post subject: While I was gone, they flew away Reply to topic Reply with quote
Being from Rocket City U.S.A., I always have had an interest in anything that's cool and flies. Last Saturday morning was a memorial for my mother's husband, as I was getting ready, my mother's cousins came in and asked me if I had heard about the shuttle. A vacuum opened in front of me and I knew what I would find out would be the worst.
CNN gave me the true story, moments after it was discovered that the worst had happened.
I can remember being in class in high school in 1986 and the announcement for the Challenger accident coming in over the intercom. You could feel the atmosphere on your skin at that moment.

The town I was raised in has three schools named after dead astronauts. Chaffee, Grissom and White - http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/history/apollo/apollo-1/apollo-1.html

Quote:
"If we die, we want people to accept it. We're in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life."
-Gus Grissom (John Barbour et al., Footprints on the Moon (The Associated Press, 1969), p. 125.)


I prayed for those people and their families. I have never seen so much information about one item at once. CNN had five to seven streams of information on the screen at once. It never really hit me until I saw the kids standing and looking at a NASA, space flight helmet in a field in Texas. The helmet had been dented and burned.

The next day on NPR I heard story after story about the accident. The following is an item I found to be particularly pertinent.

Quote:
Hi, I'm Jessi Hall, 16, from Jamestown, Ohio, a small town near Dayton, Ohio. This morning I was on my way back home from a music competition and mom turned the radio to NPR. We heard the middle of an interview with someone who had seen something tragic. When we heard it was the shuttle Columbia, it was like a blow. When we got home, I sat down at the computer and wrote a poem about my experience and reaction to the news.

sitting in the car talking to my mom

i heard the man say 'debris'

i thought of the Columbia but I wanted to be sure

he said the trail was purple

and too wide to be one piece we hung on his every word

it seemed to me an eternity

had passed before we knew that the crew of seven

on their way back to family

had been left in space amidst the stars to sleep

oh starry skies will keep them safe

but what of us down here

tears are shed for those who stay

in orbit 'round reality

oh starry skies will hide the fear

of all there is to come

grief is felt for those who say

"you see that bright star winking at us now,

that bright star is my dad"

"you see that star that sped along the sea,

that shooting star is my mom"

(Taken from the NPR site. http://discover.npr.org/features/feature.jhtml?wfId=962284)

I looked around and didn't find anything on ArizonaHikers about the accident, if it's there let me know. God bless those people and their families.

Thanks,
GTG
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cakewalk





Joined: 03 Jan 2003
Posts: 512
PostPosted: 2/7/2003, 1:16 am    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote
Nope your words are the first, im not sure why no one has posted on this matter, I almost did a few times. I, like you, took the news pretty hard, Ive been a close follower of the shuttle program from its very inception.

I put a small memorial on my weblog, maybe it a case of media overload.
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evenstar





Joined: 03 Jan 2003
Posts: 5548
Location: SCW by way of CA
PostPosted: 2/12/2003, 4:50 pm    Post subject: Reply to topic Reply with quote
http://www.lafleur4.net/shuttle/shuttle.html
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John Richardson and Richie Rich, El Perro de Playero
http://members.tripod.com/~evenstar/index.html
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When the Man waked up he said, "What is Wild Dog doing here?" And the Woman said, "His name is not Wild Dog anymore, but the First Friend, because he will be our friend for always and always and always. Take him with you when you go hunting."
--Rudyard Kipling, from Just So Stories, 1902
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