Lift Off!

Lift Off! was Originally Posted on August 16, 2009 by lavarock

I was browsing Wikipedia tonight, looking at the Woodstock entry. Many people know where they were during the Woodstock Festival (either at Bethel NY or not). I was ready to go, but was stopped dead by my Father, whom I think knew where I was off to. I believe my friend Don S. went though.

Then something made me do another search. This one brought up the dates of April 12th and April 14th, 1981. My friend Jeff and I were in Florida, watching STS-1 take off. The first shuttle launch was delayed and when I heard why, I made a suggestion, which turned out to be the solution. The 3 shuttle computers were all powered up at the same time, and all spoke at once and listed at once to see which computers are online. My suggestion was to randomly restart the computers. Sure enough, that is what they ended up doing.

I also attended the 3rd shuttle launch and cannot remember which one, but I am imortalized on the press transcripts as asking a question to Mission Control after the launch.

I still have many of the press kits including details of the soon to be infamous O rings.

At the launches, I took many photos and could see whet they looked like (before developing them) by looking in the newspaper the next day. Standing next to Time and Newsweek and the guys from the Florida local newspapers.

The photos I took are all 35mm and I have scanned a couple of the photos to digital, but they leave a bit to be desired. Perhaps I’ll try again soon since I have a better scanner now.

The low-res photo is at: blog.itskona.com