Three years ago today, NASA launched the final space shuttle mission, STS-135. It’s an appropriate time to mention just how much I love NASA.
Yes, you read that correctly. I really, really love NASA. Really.
If you’re a regular reader, you might be surprised by that assertion, given my comments here, here, and here. But the belief that I do nothing but criticize and rag on NASA couldn’t be further from the truth, and I’ll tell you why.
Because when I was five, my dad dragged me out of bed at O’Dark-Thirty and we sat there for hours to see an American get shot into space.
Photo: NASA
Because all through the Sixties I devoured every
Photo: Life Magazine
Photo: Look Magazine
Photo: Time Magazine
and
Photo: National Geographic Magazine
that I could find with pictures of every single manned and unmanned space shot.
Because the Mercury Program showed us that we had the right stuff.
Photo: NASA
Because Gemini taught us how to do the things we had to do to get to the moon.
Photo: NASA
Because Ed White took the first US spacewalk.
Photo: NASA
Because Mariner showed us that Mars had craters instead of canals.
Photo: JPL
Because we learned what “renedezvous” meant, and how to do it.
Photo: NASA
Because we faced down an ‘angry alligator.’
Photo: NASA
Because we paid for our mistakes with Apollo 1.
Photo: NASA
Grissom. White. Chaffee.
Photo: NASA
Because Surveyor showed that we could land on the moon and scouted the path.
Photo: NASA
Because at the end of 1968, when we as a country had endured assassinations, riots over civil rights, the growing war in Vietnam, we ended the year with our first view of the home planet rising above the horizon of another world, while the words of Genesis were read to us on Christmas Eve.
Photo: NASA
Because the Eagle landed at Tranquility Base. And the entire world watched, breathless, as we saw the first steps on the moon, live on our televisions.
Photo: NASA
Because Apollo 13 taught us that “failure is not an option.”
Photo: NASA
Because I watched Apollo 17 leaving the moon, on live television. I talked my parents into letting me stay home from school for three days to watch the final moonwalks live, because they were the last ones for then. Who knew that forty-five years later, they would still the last ones?
Photo: NASA
Because I got to see Skylab launch, and we started on the next steps, learning to live in space.
Photo: NASA
Because Pioneer showed us what Jupiter and Saturn looked like up close and made us want so much more.
Photo: JPL
Because Viking landed safely on Mars, proving that it could be done, and showed us what the surface of another planet looked like up close. If only we could scoot over and touch that one…
Photo: JPL
Because the Voyagers showed us Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, plus all of their large moons, in absolutely stunning detail. And then they kept going, finally reaching interstellar space. The Voyagers are still working, now in the thirty-seventh year of their three-year mission.
Photo: JPL
Because the Space Shuttle was the most magnificent machine ever built, despite being the result of a thousand compromises. It may not have been perfect and it may not have been as cheap as it was supposed to be, but it was the most beautiful thing to ever see lifting off the pad.
Photo: NASA
Because Sally Ride led the way, leading the way for so many women who have followed.
Photo: NASA
Because Challenger again showed us the price of hubris.
Photo: NASA
Scobee. Smith. McNair. Onizuka. Resnik. Jarvis. McAullife.
Photo: NASA
Because Galileo, although partially crippled, showed us things at Jupiter that we never dreamed of. In July, 2016 the Juno mission will arrive at Jupiter and show us even more.
Photo: JPL
Because the Hubble Space Telescope has extended our vision a million fold.
Photo: NASA
Because the HST Repair Missions were necessary to fix Hubble when it first was launched, showing levels of ingenuity, problem solving, and skill not seen since Apollo 13, all accomplished flawlessly.
Photo: NASA
Because Pathfinder let us go touch that rock over there on Mars, and when it landed I sat with my three kids, watching the feed from JPL to see if it had succeeded and cheering those first pictures.
Photo: JPL
Because the International Space Station is the biggest international project in history, showing that multiple nations on almost every continent can work together to build the most complex and advanced laboratory ever, and showing everyone what their planet looks like from space every day.
Photo: NASA
Because Columbia showed us again that this was an extremely dangerous business, no matter how easy we made it look time after time after time. Yet we picked up the pieces and flew again.
Photo: NASA
Husband. McCool. Anderson. Chawla. Brown. Clark. Ramon.
Photo: NASA
Because Spirit roamed around Mars for 2,210 sols of its 90-sol mission before getting stuck in the sand. One of these days we’ll have to go rescue her and bring her back home. (Thanks, Randall, even though it makes me cry every time.)
Photo: JPL
Because Opportunity is STILL roaming around Mars, now in her 3,715 sol of her 90-sol mission.
Photo: JPL
Because Cassini has not only sent back over 332,000 pictures of Saturn, her rings, and her moons, it also put the Huygens probe down on the surface of Titan ten years ago. And it’s still going.
Photo: JPL
Because Curiosity landed on Mars using a freakin’ rocket powered sky crane and it’s as big as an SUV, nuclear powered, laser shooting, climbing Mount Sharp, now in the 683rd sol of its 90-sol mission.
Photo: JPL
See, I REALLY LOVE NASA. All of these missions and hundreds and hundreds more. All of the tens and hundreds of thousands of people who work so hard to make sure that the billion necessary details get done so that the impossible somehow becomes the possible.
I would kill to work at JPL or for some NASA site. I wanted (and still want, desperately) to be an astronaut, to see the Earth from orbit, from the moon, or in my rear-view mirror as we head to Mars. But even if I can’t do that, there are so many other amazing things that NASA and JPL do routinely, things that I would do anything to participate in and help accomplish.
NASA is now holding “NASA Socials” for many of its launches and major events, inviting bloggers and others active in social media so that word about their new missions gets spread far and wide. So far I’ve not been chosen as one of the NASA Social participants, but I’m going to keep trying.
When I rant about what NASA isn’t doing, it’s because there are so many things that it has done and so many amazing and fantastic things that it could do if given the chance. Those I rant at are the bureaucrats and the politicians, particularly the politicians. Don’t confuse my contempt for our current “leadership” with my utter admiration for those in the trenches at NASA, doing the impossible on a daily basis.
So, just in case I’ve been too subtle,
We Love The Stars Too Fondly 