Planets hanging from the light

The ideas that Austyn comes up with on his own are always such wonderful ideas. This is a project that he undertook to start to decorate his room with planets.

Shuttle Launch - Discovery

We finally saw a Shuttle Launch. We expected the sun to be coming up when it launched but instead it was still dark with a hint of blue when the launch began. It was the night launch we always wanted to see!

As some of you know, we attempted to see a launch a couple of months earlier. It was worth the wait. If  you want more information about this most recent mission, the mission name is STS-132 and their website is http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html.

 The sound was very delayed. This may have been the point that we actually started to hear the loud sound. I also think that by looking at this picture that this could be when the boosters separated? We have seen two other launches from central Florida at night and could see the boosters come away from the shuttle very clearly, but up close we had trouble deciding when that actually happened. 

The boosters are close together and still the brightest light in the sky. They are becoming more of a simmering red colour here. 

They have burned out and fallen here and the shuttle is moving on in space. There is a large contrail after the shuttle and it appears to be flying downward but actually it's flying around the earth at an imaginable speed. We watched it as it went over the horizon.

After attempting this a couple of months before we were much better prepared this time. We left early, knew where to park, slept in the van with the blankets and pillows from our resort, and stayed put after the launch until traffic started to move. While relaxing in our parking spot we watched the smoke from the launch transform into an interesting glowing cloud (from the sunrise). I think that it almost looked like a cartoon face in the sky. 

Leaving our spot we crossed a bridge and saw the boats. They had a nice view and it looked like it'd be very peaceful in the boats. They couldn't park on the other side because there is a military helicopter that patrols all night long making sure that the whole area around the launch site is clear of people.

The kids were pooped! It was a long night sleeping in the van. At least we tried another route back to our condo this time and it paid off. We were at a Waffle House in Orlando eating in no time at all!

Shuttle Launch

The reason for us visiting Florida after the first reason, which was to relax and catch some rays, was for us to see the very last night shuttle launch. We left our resort at 8pm and arrived in Titusville before most of the crowd. We found the perfect spot along the highway just north of the town and pulled over where there was some construction. We had such a perfect view of the launch pad. If we wanted to we could see it from our van. We brought snacks and drinks and conveniently parked next to a portable toilet. We flattened the seats in the back, made a bed and we camped out in the van with our in-laws until launch time which was at 4:39 AM. We got out of the van about 15 minutes before after listening to the radio station. They stated that everything was fine and that it was still "A Go". We got out with two sleepy kids in arms and walked closer to the water to watch. With only 10 minutes to launch we heard that the launch was scrubbed until the next day. What a disappointment. It took us over an hour to get out of our parking spot and we didn't get back to Orlando area until 8 AM. It was a long night with little to no sleep.

With small children it's next to impossible to catch up on that sleep during the day so we ended up not returning the next night. It might have been too dangerous to attempt that again with no sleep. The news said that there was only a 60% chance that it would actually launch that night, but at 4:15 it did launch and we dragged the kids out of bed to run out to a clear area to see it from our resort. We had seen a night launch before from there and had an idea where to go and where to look. It would have been nice to see it close but we at least saw it. I got some sleepy, blurry pictures of it. The first picture was with the boosters still on the shuttle and the second picture is of the shuttle moving on while the boosters are falling to earth below.

 

  

Here is the website explaining the shuttle mission. 

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/index.html

The next week they scheduled a rocket launch. The rocket was going on a mission to learn more about the sun. We planned on driving to see that but again on the news they said that the wind had to be under 20 knots and at the time it was 22, so things didn't look good. They canceled it and the next day it went. We slept in and decided not to go since it was only suppose to have a 60% chance of going. It went. We got to watch it on the news live, but didn't make it to see it live. We looked outside to see if it was viewable from where we were but it was just too cloudy. 

Here is the website with status reports on rockets that have been launched. The rocket that went up was called ELV-021210. 

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/launchingrockets/status/2010/elvstatus-20100212.html

 Austyn was so inspired by the rocket that he made his own with Legos.

  

We also worked on his Space lapbook. The kids loved working on their lapbooks while we were away. 

“I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine” ~ Neil Armstrong

Space Travel - added links

I downloaded a couple of space lapbooks and made them into one. Here is one of the activities that went along with the lap-book.  It's a cut out rocket. The rocket sits on a launch pad and when you hit the one end of the launch pad the rocket shoots out the top.

We are still working on the lap-book and may do some of it on vacation. I'll post more of it when it's finished. It's a THICK one!

Here are the links to the lapbooks I found:

http://www.homeschoolshare.com/space_lapbook.php

http://homeschoolhelperonline.com/lapbooks/astronaut.htm

“The most important thing we can do is inspire young minds and to advance the kind of science, math and technology education that will help youngsters take us to the next phase of space travel.” ~ John Glenn