Blast off!

Last night, Dr. Dana Baker, good friend and former blendedschools.net board member, and I drove from the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando to Titusville for a front row seat of the space shuttle Discovery blast off. From the veranda of a Cuban cafe and pub, we enjoyed orchestra seating. Lift off produced a fireball as large and bright as a sunrise on a clear morning. 15 seconds later, a mighty sonic boom rumbled across the sky. Prior to lift off, we received a play-by-play preview of what we were about to see from Mike and his wife. Both are Penn State graduates and Mike is an aerospace engineer who helped solve the gas leak that delayed the launch by three days. In the morning, Dana and I were among the several thousand educators who listened to NASA astronaut Eileen Collins share her thoughts about transcending space through leadership. It is a good thing it was such a NASA rich day, because the 73 mile drive back to our hotels kept us on the road until 2:00 AM. Who would have thought everyone in Florida drives to the cape for shuttle launches?