Fun fact: Dick Nixon was the president who first authorized the program back in 1969.
Zipped up to the roof to see the shuttle buzz the Bay area yesterday - there are some great pictures that were taken near the Golden Gate, google to see. Our building is across the street from AT&T and looks east towards Oakland. Unfortunately yesterday was pretty hazy, and that has a tendency to look worse than it really is in the rising sun. She flew up from the southeast, went behind the ballpark...
... and then flew more towards the northeast side of the Bay; I believe they were shooting to fly above Berkeley and then head for the GG. Here's a shot looking toward Oakland...
Anyhoo, it was a thrill to see it, me being old enough to remember when the first one went off in 1982.
A salute to those who gave their lives for this program: Greg Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, Michael J. Smith and Dick Scobee on Challenger, and Rick Husband, William McCool, Michael P. Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David M. Brown, Laurel Clark and IIan Ramon on Columbia.
Thank you for your sacrifice - the dream lives on.