NASA STS-134 It took me 13 attempts to finally see the Space Shuttle launch, but thanks very much to Tim Flors, I was finally able to see NASA flight STS-134 in the early hours of the morning in May.

The Space Shuttle Between May of 2009 and May of 2011 I visited Orlando and ultimately Cape Canaveral 13 separate times in hopes of seeing the Space Shuttle lift off With NASA s 30 year Space Shuttle program finally coming to an end this was the last chance I would have to see the spectacle The only thing I ve ever really wanted to do was to become an astronaut and visit space this was as close as I might get I was originally scheduled to see the 3rd to final shuttle launch My friend Dave G and I drove across the country for the opportunity After the launch was scrubbed several times we had to drive back home Dave wasn t interested in trying again but I decided I was going to see the launch regardless of the effort involved I missed the 3rd to last launch due to obligations and the situation grew more dire there were only two launches left After two years of routine trips between Austin and Orlando and after many many thousands of dollars spent and some 60 hours in the air I finally saw Space Shuttle Endeavour lift off on May 16th 2011 at 8 56am EST as part of a href http en wikipedia org wiki STS 134 STS 134 a The story of how it happened is even more amazing iframe width 521 height 293 src https www youtube com embed 2dfLr9O02l0 frameborder 0 allowfullscreen iframe My dear friend Tim had a connection with the NASA visitors team at Cape Canaveral As a hotel executive with the Gaylord Palms he ensured that families and friends of astronauts and other important people connected to NASA had the opportunity to see launches from the 3 mile VIP center photo 22841 564 0 right My visitors badge photo photo 25593 640 0 right The incredible F5 engines on the Saturn V rocket photo Experiencing a scrubbed launch was both frustrating and exhausting The launch process basically consisted of me driving 90 minutes from Orlando towards the outskirts of Cape Canaveral I d then have to board a private NASA bus that would take me from the bus terminal to the visitor s area 3 miles from the launch site I would often sit with families of the astronauts and extremely gifted scientists from around the world That part was wonderful The weather was a different story It was consistently hot and very humid I would be on site for six to eight hours at a time I passed the time by strolling around the NASA museum gazing at the old Saturn rocket series Those spacecraft are absolutely amazing marvels of engineering The launches would usually be scrubbed after about 8 hours of waiting when the clock was down to the last hour It was gut wrenching every time and I d have to spend another 2 3 hours fighting traffic to get back to Orlando I had just flown back to Austin after yet another scrubbed launch and was extremely disappointed This was the 12th launch that I had seen scrubbed I had become pretty well known to many of the officials at Cape Canaveral as Tim s friend from Austin Despite being a bad omen at that point they were very welcoming I hadn t been in Austin but a day when Tim called me up and told me that the launch had just been rescheduled and that he had a seat for me he always got the relaunch dates and times before they were made public I really did not want to make the trip because I was so exhausted of the process but he had a good feeling about it and so I did The catch was that he would be in Jacksonville going on a date with a girl named Courtney she was a friend of a friend I wound up getting to meet her that weekend and attended their wedding the following year I bought a last minute ticket to Jacksonville Tim told me he would take care of everything else He did When I arrived in Jacksonville I had a text message from Tim instructing me to visit the valet in front of the airport I was to show them my ID I did They presented me the keys to a car I got in the car and inside was a post it note on the GPS telling me to follow the directions to the pre programmed destination There was a note instructing me to use a false name when I got to the gate and that I was there to see the Daltons There was also a ticket to the Jacksonville PGA tour Without talking to Tim I drove about an hour to the GPS destination as instructed When I got to the private community gate I told the guard I was Brian Dalton as instructed He welcomed me and directed me to their home When I finally arrived at their home complete strangers to me mind you there was a guy waiting for me on a golf cart with a beer He asked me if I was Kevin and upon confirmation told me to get in and to bring my ticket The beer was for me He drove me on the golf cart to the front of the PGA security gate and walked me in with my ticket He walked me over to Tim hanging out with the girl he had just met and I got to watch all of the famous golfers do their thing I m not much for golfing but it was an enjoyable time getting drunk photo 25619 640 0 right The official clock with about 1hr 20m to go photo We left around 8pm with a bunch of people including Courtney had an incredibly drunken sushi dinner and proceeded to drive to Tim s house in Kissimmee Florida By the time we got there it was around midnight We went to bed woke up at 4 15 in the morning and drove our way to Cape Canaveral with the top down in his car jamming out to Lonely Island We were on our way to see the final NASA shuttle launch of all time Two hours later I saw one of the most spectacular sites of my life It s impossible to describe what a shuttle launch is like in person There is no film I have ever seen that truly captures the power of it I was delighted to check off another bucket list item Tim is a really great friend Even sweeter is that NASA wound up adding one last flight Courtney was there for that one

The Engine Failure The plan was for a solo XC from AUS gt AQO gt LZZ gt BMQ gt AUS Total time planned was 3 5 hrs including FSTB gassing up and eating lunch I think the flight was about 160nm round robin Preflight was completely normal oil was just a tick below 5qt gas looked fine instruments were okay and the mags checked out The left one dropped just slightly below normal so I leaned out the plane for about a minute per our procedure and rechecked it It tested within the norm the second time I departed Austin at 17 51Z a bit behind schedule but I was okay with this Very smooth departure and climb I even got routed over my property and then Mueller so I was really enjoying my views I probably reached my planned altitude of 6 500 just after the towers on Hwy 360 I leaned the mixture out as always waited for the brief drop in RPM and then a few ticks back to the right Around this time I was switched over to Houston Center for flight following on 134 20 photo 21130 521 520 left Climbing past 5 000 feet on my way to a planned 6 500 photo Around 18 35Z just getting over the intersection of HWY 281 in Marble Falls and still at 6 500 feet I noticed the engine was starting to lose power I couldn t hear it or feel it but I saw it on the tach It was dropping about 100 RPM for 1 2 second every 15 20 seconds or so I just began monitoring it and after a minute or so alerted Houston Center to my finding They asked if I wanted to declare any emergency and I said no I just wanted to say it in case the problem got worse and I needed more attention They asked me to keep them updated and business was as usual The problem persisted About 2 5 minutes later the problem got worse and I started noticing the engine dropping about 300 RPM for 1 2 seconds every 15 20 seconds with the 100 RPM drops interspersed between those I immediately alerted Houston Center to the problem with something to the effect of Houston Center Cessna 67796 My engine is definitely having problems now probably going to have to land They quickly started giving me very close attention and asking if I had power and such I replied yes but that the engine was suffering power losses At this time we established that I was a student pilot on a solo XC I had already located a bunch of fields by this time and as HC noted Horseshoe Bay was just a few miles off to my west about my 10 o clock according to Houston Though I tried to remain calm I m sure they could sense some panic in my voice by this time Still I kept doing things as needed and now treated the situation as an emergency assuming that the engine would die at any moment I went through the emergency checklist though it didn t seem to fix the 300 RPM drops I was still communicating with Houston treating the situation as an emergency and the problem was still persisting I definitely had Horseshoe Bay in my sights just a few miles off to the west and was just a little below my previous altitude I informed them that the problem was still continuing and that I would be heading for Horseshoe Bay Though I had them handy I requested the runway configuration airport elevation and the CTAF All three were given to me Just as I started my left turn and about 1 second before my heart would momentarily stop the engine lost almost compete power I can t be sure but it dropped down to about 1000 1200 RPM basically just above idle and held there for a moment before jumping back up At this point I told Houston that I had a more severe problem and that the engine was probably about to die They passed me over to Horseshoe Bay and those guys started bringing me in They cleared out all other traffic and told me either runway was mine for the taking I was still around 5 800 feet at this time PA is 2 100 about 3 miles west of the field and more or less on a perfect left line for a left downwind to runway 35 the preferred runway was for 17 but surface wind was only about 3 kts so I stuck with 35 I told Horseshoe Bay that I would be making a long extension of my downwind in order to lose my excess altitude I probably went about twice as far as normal before turning base doing the best I could to calculate all of the differences quickly in my head The engine seemed to be working with me at this point but I was also making a lot of adjustments to it so hard to know for sure I turned base still a bit too high but plenty far out On final I quickly got down to a good altitude slowed enough for flaps and added a notch The other two notches came in at my discretion as I basically was landing by feeling it out I put it down on 35 and it was actually a really nice smooth and otherwise uneventful landing Taxiing didn t seem to be much of an issue either The guy waved me to a spot and was happy to see me We called Houston Center immediately to let them know and also Flight Service to alter and close my flight plan photo 21110 521 520 left N47796 on the ground at Horseshoe Bay after my failed engine photo