I’m currently over in Florida with my wife visiting the Kennedy Space Centre for 2 days which is part of my retirement holiday.
It’s definitely a must for IIS members to visit once in their lifetime if you have the money, time and health
The Apollo Saturn 5 Centre has an unused Saturn 5 rocket lying on its side , an awe inspiring piece of engineering and technology.Its absolutely enormous and hard to believe they got this thing off the ground ( stage 1 power plant had a lift off thrust of 7.5 million pounds or equivalent to 160 million horsepower !!! )
Where doing day 2 which includes a visit to the original Mercury program launch sites and block house etc..
Wife was doing some RunDisney events at Disney World in January 2016 and we managed a day there. Only did one of the behind the scenes tours (which was fantastic, wished we could have done more) and with the drive out and back that fairly much filled the daylight hours. Would have liked to have seen more but we could only manage one day. Was one of the highlights of the holiday, could not get over the 'gators in the drainage channels as we bused around the centre. Guess they help keep security costs down!
1/ Replica of Hubble Space Telescope
2/ Unused Apollo Saturn 5 rocket with me standing under it ( enormous machine )
3/ Replica Mercury Redstone rocket on launch pad where Alan Shepard first took the US into space ( May 5. 1961 )
4/ Apollo 14 Command Module ( note it is all burnt , charred and rusted from re entry)
5/ New Space X hanger near pad 39A
6/ Apollo Vehicle Assembly Building VAB ( was built to assemble the Saturn 5 rocket from 1966 to 1972 then the Space shuttle from 1977 onwards) Was the largest building in the world by volume , now the 6th largest !
Incredible visit !!!
NASA are developing their SLS and Orion spacecraft for a man rated earth orbital mission in late 2019 or early 2020 and a lunar orbital mission in 2022.Their Mars unmanned mission is scheduled for 2032 and a Manned Mars mission around 2035 to 2040
Space X, Blue Origin and a few others out there on the Cape are pushing for an early schedule with Lunar and Mars missions
Exciting times ahead for future Space exploration !!!
