Going out with a bang....

[Miles Monroe]

It's a bit of a sad day for me. I got up a bit early, stood outside, and watched the shuttle fly over for the last time with the signature double sonic boom rattling the windows of every house.

Seventeen years of watching them go up, and often enough, come back down in resent years.

Space cadet signing off......

 

[burgold]

Yeah, I made sure that I watched the last launch. Sad to see this program end. It feels like a death symbolically.

 

[Sarge]

Ending this program without a replacement is friggin ridiculous. Now we can't even get to our own space station

 

[Burgundy Burner]

Watched the launch and watched the landing early this morning.

On to the next program.

 

[Miles Monroe]

Ending this program without a replacement is friggin ridiculous. Now we can't even get to our own space station

You sound like John Glen....

 

[Miles Monroe]

Ive said this before but if this program is being shut down where is the money going to go? We should be shown how it is put back in to use.

and I think thats really cool that you got to see the shuttles go up and down.

I'll really miss the night launches.

 

[Burgundy Burner]

The 71s were bad. What a bird. Awesome machine. Only saw two in flight - one by accident in 1979 near Charlottesville when I was at UVA. It was high in the sky and I just happen to look up for no particular reason and saw it - had to be at about 50,000 ft. Another was a surprise pass at an airshow in the mid 80s - totally stunned everyone and was not announced until about thirty seconds before a high speed pass. Also heard one back in the early 90s (by then, only NASA was flying them) and it accidentally boomed Virginia Beach as it was heading to a refueling off of the NC coast.

As for the gap until the next program - it is not that long or unusual. It was more than eight years between Apollo and the shuttle. Going more to private enterprise will really be a lot better. It won't be too long before the next generation goes up. Just be patient.