I’m an aviation junkie.  I love the mindset of people who sit there with math, look at some wings and say “you know, I bet if we throw an engine on that sucker it would fly pretty well.”  What’s even more amazing are the people who respond, “Ok I’ll sit in it and give it a shot.”

It was crazy when the Wright brothers did it, it was crazy when Chuck Yeager strapped into what was basically a rocket with wings to break the sound barrier, and even moreso when men like Yuri Gagarin and Alan Shepard strapped onto a much bigger rocket to enter space.

I could spend days writing about the amazing courage people have had to prepare to enter space and actually getting onto a rocket, not to mention the thousands of people who math’d enough to get them there.

It’s easy to be fascinated by space, which makes the reinvigorated space race of this generation all the more exciting.  With the retirement of the space shuttle, all manned space flight happens from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan (leased to the Russians).  Private companies like SpaceX and Virgin Galactic have entered the fray, saying they can get humans back into space more cheaply than a government can.

SpaceX

SpaceX is a private company headed by Elon Musk (of Tesla and PayPal fame).  Their breadth of goals is impressive: colonize Mars, give the world satellite-based WiFi, you know, normal stuff.  SpaceX has most recently been famous for sending rockets into space and returning the first stages of the rockets safely to the ground or ocean.

SpaceX has a contract with NASA to launch resupply missions.  In the early morning of March 2, CRS-20 will launch aboard a Falcon 9 rocket…

…and I’m going to be there for it with NASA’s Social team!

NASA Social

NASA’s Social team frequently hosts popular space bloggers and periodicals to come to the Kennedy Space Center, tour the facilities, speak to scientists, and observe the rocket launch from the same Press Complex as credentialed media.  I sent in an application after seeing a tweet from Elon Musk advertising the program and was so happy to be selected!

More to come, I just can’t tell you how excited I am!  I had a trip planned for New Zealand this week, but New Zealand will still be there someday, I just couldn’t pass this up.  New Zealand was easy to cancel, and flights to Florida have been booked!

I’ve attended a rocket launch before, an Atlas V from Jetty Park, and I didn’t have a wonderful angle.  This was my best picture from that day.

Atlas V Rocket

I’ve started making my final preparations and will share more about my plans to cover it soon!  In the meantime, follow along on Instagram for my up-to-the-minute stories from the event and the launch itself!