Original Shuttle Launch Photos

**Gerry** · 07-09-2011, 06:53 PM

These were sent to me yesterday.

My brother does not know how to compress photos and sends everything to me life size (just about)

Asides from taking forever to download, I had to compress them and get them in a format capable of uploading.

My brother and his wife took these from two different vantage points.

Lift Off
Tower Clear
Start Roll
Going...
Going...
Gone.

As a point of curiosity: When the shuttle lands and is all clear, the entire NASA workforce and their families will have an opportunity to walk up to the shuttle where it will stop. This is NASA's way of saying thanks to everyone. About 25,000+ people are expected.

**Acro** · 07-09-2011, 06:57 PM

Freaking amazing. I wasn't able to see this final shuttle take-off in person, unfortunately.

**draggar** · 07-09-2011, 07:11 PM

We got to watch the last Endeavor launch from our office and I got to see it on the launch pad during my visit to the KSC. I'm ashamed to say it took me 8 years to get up there. :(

It was very cloudy Friday so we didn't get to watch this one.

Cool pics, Doc.

**lordbyroniv** · 07-09-2011, 07:19 PM

Awesome photos. Thanks for sharing.

It was sad to hear that there are tens of thousands of engineers that are being laid off. One NASA engineer on the local news yesterday indicated that he would need get a job at Walmart as the Orlando community is in devastation and there are no jobs in the area

If a rocket scientist has to work at Walmart to support his family then what hope do any of us have ?

No value in education any more.

**jdk** · 07-09-2011, 09:00 PM

Great pics. It has been a while since we have been up to see a shuttle launch in person. We usually just watch it go up from our house and on tv.

**loscocco** · 07-09-2011, 09:09 PM

VERY cool pics.. thanks fro sharing!

**Gerry** · 07-09-2011, 09:26 PM

I love the vapor cones on the booster rockets in pic 5.

Honestly some of these took forever to download. Massive files.

I don't need a screen saver the size of the actual space shuttle.

**Jeroen** · 07-10-2011, 04:47 AM

Awesome as it always has been....I've been lucky to witness a launch from central Florida once. Hopefully employees involved will find something better.

**Gerry** · 07-10-2011, 06:58 PM

My brother is part of the Mobile Command Unit and Vehicle Recovery. As soon as the shuttle touches down, a new clock is started. There is a 40 vehicle convoy and the Mobile Command Unit is first in line. It takes over control of the shuttle and all ground crews.

He sent me 47 minutes of raw unedited video shot by a documentary team. This side of the shuttle launch has never been documented. I can not release this as it is unpublished yet. My brother sits behind the ground commander and next to an astronaut going over all recovery instructions page by page and check box by check box. Perhaps someday the documentary will be pieced together.

ALSO OF COOLNESS! For those of you that are into Transformers, apparently a great deal of it was shot at NASA facilities and he sent me numerous shots of the stunt people, vehicles used, some of the vehicles in various stages of transformation, and other pics. He was salavating over the custom corvette coupe they used. He held onto these for quite sometime but only sent them to me once the movie was released (he had to sign a NDA because he had access to the areas closed of to NASA employees). I can post or PM those as well. From what I have seen, GM (chevrolet) must have been the sponsor of all the vehicles. Chevy was every where.