We heard about the launch scrub just as we were pulling into Titusville. We headed back down the coast, but took A1A all the way, so it was a longer, but more scenic trip.
I find it a little ironic that the part that failed today was one of the components that Mike wants to keep ad infinitum, while there was no problem with the Orbiter, which he wants to retire. I may have some further thoughts on this at TechCentralStation, if I can work up the gumption for a piece, but unfortunately, because I lost any productivity today to this futile expedition, I’ve got three other deadlines breathing down my neck in the next couple days.
We’re driving up to watch the launch. I hadn’t thought I was going to be in Florida this week, so I didn’t bother to try to get a base pass, so we’ll probably just watch from across the river in Titusville. No blogging–I don’t have Verizon wireless, and doubt if I’ll find a connection up there.
I don’t have the stomach to wade through Democratic Underground, or Kos, but I can’t imagine that they ever have as funny a thread as this one at Free Republic.
Melanie Phillips has a disturbing letter from a British Muslim. As she says:
Truth and lies are at the very heart of this terrible problem facing us all. The sense of grievance and injustice to which this reader refers is indeed very real. But it is the grievance of a people who turn their own misdeeds into their own victimology, thus making rational discourse all but impossible. The tragedy is that this reader and I undoubtedly have much in common
I just got a call from Bill Khourie (pronounced ‘curry’), Director of OSIDA who let me know that they are putting their finishing touches on Oklahoma’s spaceport application with FAA AST and environmental impact statement and are targetting December 2005 for approval for horizontal takeoff horizontal landing vehicles. He said they would be delighted to be approached by the vertical crowd and would be pleased to welcome them assuming AST says OK.
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Wednesday, 15:30 CDT: One of the vertical crowd emailed me and said that they already approached OSIDA some time ago and “would be pleased” might not be enough to get a new AST spaceport application filed.