“And with that we’ll take a break. You’re listening to WSPX AM 790, Florida’s choice for news and talk up and down the Space Coast, I’m Craig Randall. We’ll take more of your calls in just a minute. Don’t go away.”
Stangley beat Brown to the restaurant and decided to take his table rather than wait for him in the lobby. He caught a glimpse of the “Specials” board, but had no time to read them, because the hostess whisked him off to a table. The place was only half-full, but it took only twenty seconds for someone to recognize him. Stangley acknowledged with a friendly wave.
Stangley was acutely aware of his recently enhanced celebrity status—having a private meal in Cocoa Beach, or anywhere along the Space Coast for that matter, was impossible. He felt like a politician trying to enjoy an uninterrupted meal in D.C.—forget it. Stangley hoped the lateness of the hour would help limit his exposure to the public.
As he sat at his table browsing the menu, he sensed that fatigue had found him at last. He suddenly felt tired in every muscle and joint. His eyes were heavy and his appetite was waning.
Before he finished the first panel of the menu, Stangley looked up to see a waiter walking in his direction. He was tall, thin, young, smiling—and familiar. Stangley remembered the waiter as the one who had served Claire and him. It was the last trip they had taken to Cocoa Beach before she died.
“Good evening, Mr. Stangley,” the waiter said, as if Stangley were one of the restaurant’s regulars.
“Hi,” Stangley replied in an understated way, trying to downplay the fact that the waiter recognized him.
“I haven’t seen you in a long time, well on TV of course, but I do remember your last visit. You were here with your wife, right? No way could I forget her!”
“It’s been almost two years,” Stangley responded.
“She isn’t dining with you tonight?”
The waiter quickly saw from Stangley’s expression that what was coming next was going to be awkward at best.
Stangley hesitated a beat because he still had trouble saying it. “My wife died a little over eleven months ago, cancer.”
“Oh God, I’m so sorry…” the waiter stammered.
“It’s okay—really,” Stangley cut him off reassuringly. They both recognized the waiter had stepped on a land mine.
“I’m so sorry,” the waiter repeated, hoping a bolt of lightning would strike, rendering him more than dead.
“Really, it’s okay, there’s no way you could have known.” As far as Stangley was concerned, the waiter had remembered his dear wife Claire. That was all that mattered.
“Been waiting long?” Brown appeared and slipped into the booth.
“No, I just got here.”
Brown’s arrival was a gift from God to the waiter, who took the opportunity to slip away.
Brown studied Stangley’s face for a second, then took a sip of water from the glass in front of him. “You look like hell, like you saw a ghost.”
Stangley raised a single eyebrow but didn’t look up from the menu. “I did see a ghost.”
“You’ve been here before with Claire, right?”
Stangley nodded, “Once.”
Brown turned his head to watch the waiter walk away. “Did the waiter? Oh, shit, the waiter recognized you and asked about Claire?” Brown had met Stangley’s wife on several occasions, and remembered her as being quite attractive, not someone you could easily forget.
Stangley gave Brown another nod.
“Sorry man, I know how that feels. I went through the same thing after Helen died.” Brown paused as if calculating. “It’s been almost two-and-a-half years now. Where does the time go, right? I remember when I finally got up enough courage and strength to go out for dinner on my own, you know after I’d eaten every meal in the frickin’ frozen-entree lineup. Five minutes on high, rotate a quarter-turn, three minutes more. Anyway, I would run into acquaintances, you know, people who didn’t really know me or Helen personally. It stings, really rips your heart out, believe me I know.”
“Just when you think you’re past it,” Stangley said finally, “something happens or someone says something that pulls you right back. The strength you thought you had built up, the wall you thought you’d constructed to insulate yourself from being hurt by it any further, turns out to be thinner than you imagined.”
Brown lowered his menu and studied Stangley again. “I’m sure I wouldn’t shock you if I told you I don’t follow all that psychobabble crap. All I know is that it takes time, mostly. You can see a therapist or whatever to ‘talk through it,’ ” Brown said, motioning tiny quote marks with his fingers, “but the common denominator among those who are able to go on after a loved one dies is time.” Brown picked up his menu again. “Hey, what’s good here?” he asked, signaling he was through with the topic.
“The pastas are good,” Stangley replied easily, grateful that Brown had changed the subject.
“I think I’m leaning toward the pizzas.” Brown looked around. “You think the waiter will ever be back? You probably scared the shit out of him. I doubt he’s coming back.”
Stangley laughed and felt himself relax. “So how are things going on your end? You guys ready to go flyin’?”
“Well, things do seem to be going well, everything considered,” Brown said, watching Stangley pour first a pool of olive oil then a pool of vinegar onto a bright white saucer. “We’ve been watching the weather closely. You know we can hustle to get Atlantis ready to fly, but if the weather turns to crap, we’re screwed. So far, though, it looks like we’ll be in good shape, I mean nothing bad is forecasted. It looks like we won’t have to bring the stack back into the VAB for a hailstorm or heavy winds before the first launch window opens.”
“So what’s your gut on this?” Stangley asked, wiping a piece of bread in a smooth vinegar-then-olive-oil swipe. “Off the record, do you think NASA will get a launch in nine days?”
Brown’s stomach ached at the site of the olive oil. He fingered the outside of his left pants pocket, felt the round Tums tablets and the longer, thinner, missile-shaped Norco tablets. Mild relief came knowing they were at the ready. “I’m not superstitious, but I must admit I fear being too optimistic—this mission scares the hell out of me. I can’t decide if I think the rescue crew is brave or just plain crazy. You’ve met plenty of astronauts over the years, you know what I mean, you know what they’re like.”
Flaminia’s house merlot found Stangley and wrapped him in a warm melancholy blanket. The bread tasted so good, his head felt light and free, and he sure missed Claire. He imagined her beside him, drew in a deep breath and was certain he could smell her perfume. Wasn’t that her sitting beside him? Smiling. She was the happiest person he’d ever known.
Stangley nodded in agreement. Astronauts are a different breed, he thought. “Okay, so what if they can’t get a launch off? What then? The crew of Columbia is going to go for it, right?”
Brown stared back at Stangley, then shrugged.
“Well, they’re not going to stay up there until they suffocate, they will go for it, right?”
Brown’s eyes were pensive. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Won’t NASA have to clear a path for Columbia? I mean traveling west, it’s a long way from the California coast to the Kennedy Space Center. If Columbia flies over populated areas… If by some miracle it makes it back, great. But what if it’s coming apart as it flies overhead, dropping God knows what along the way?” Stangley paused for a second, thinking. “I guess if they knew it was going to come apart, they’d shoot for Edwards instead of Kennedy. Is that what you were going to say?”
Brown simply sat in silence, not knowing what to say. He had no idea what contingencies NASA might be planning.
“Have you heard the fuss from elementary school teachers?”
“No,” Brown said, then turned to see if he could spot the waiter. “What are they upset about?”
“Well, the teachers are wondering how to handle the
ir students in the event that Atlantis isn’t launched.”
Brown frowned like he didn’t get it.
“They’ve spent twenty-plus days teaching their students all about the shuttle, watched some of the specials we did on shuttle processing. They’ve gotten to know the astronauts of both crews.
Brown’s expression softened.
“If the shuttle doesn’t launch, the kids will immediately understand the implications,” Stangley said.
“I get it,” Brown said, looking again for the waiter. “Their generation will produce an unusually small group of astronauts.”
Stangley changed the subject. “So, will you go to Johnson after the launch, or will you stay here in Florida to watch Atlantis land?”
“That’s a very interesting question, my friend. Well, after the launch we’ll have our reviews to do, but once we clear the films, I may go to Houston and hang around Mission Control, watch the landing from there. It’ll be a great place to be on landing day, and much less of a circus than at Kennedy. Especially since the president is expected to be there.”
“Will you be going back to Houston to say good-bye?”
Brown recoiled slightly, as if his mind had been read. Then he got up suddenly. “I’m going to go find the waiter.”
Part III
The Endeavor
Chapter 46
Cape Canaveral, Florida
Columbia Flight Day 25
Sunday Feb. 9, 2003
A COASTAL BREEZE infused with a hint of brine drifted inland over the Cape, traveling over the pristine Atlantic coastline and the storied NASA beach house, past the estuaries and the shuttle launch facilities, and finally out to the thousands of spectators who hungered to participate in American history.
The air itself seemed alive, buzzing with energy like a power line smothered in fog.
Permeating the crowd was an unmistakable sense of optimism, something many veteran spaceflight spectators said had been missing from the Cape since July 1969—back when a Saturn V rocket sat waiting on the very same launch pad, begging to take three men to the moon.
Atlantis and her crew were alone now on pad 39A. The final nine-minute countdown to launch was about to begin. Closeout personnel, or “Cape crusaders,” had done their jobs, helped the crew into their seats, said their goodbyes, closed and locked the hatch, and finally had evacuated the launch platform by T-minus-twenty-minutes.
Local time at Cape Canaveral was now 11:02 P.M., but at launch pad 39A where Atlantis and her crew waited it was bright as daytime. From every conceivable angle, Sterner Infranor series 595 lamps blasted the shuttle stack and the fixed and rotating service structures. The white solid rocket boosters and the wings of Atlantis glistened and shimmered like a Hollywood starlet bathed in the glow of a billion candelas.
In the adjacent Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, snow egrets, double-crested cormorants and green-backed herons scampered in their habitat; the light-spill from the launch pad had triggered a fear response in them. It was just another hazard of living next door to such an explosively bright, deafeningly loud, great beast of a neighbor.
Nearly all television programming had been preempted by coverage of the Atlantis launch, except for on some of the more obscure cable stations; but even they added a news bulletin crawl. The Food Network was showing its support for the NASA frenzy; all week long it had been airing special programming on how and what to serve if you were throwing a launch party. The network’s most popular hosts demonstrated how to grill perfect “rocket dogs” and “launch patties.”
Today, mobile camera crews invaded sports bars across the country. No matter the city they reported from, the results were the same: The bars were all packed with people waiting for the launch of Atlantis. Not the least bit camera-shy, these patrons raised their glasses and cheered; they would act no differently if their team was just minutes away from winning the Super Bowl.
On CNN, one of Stangley’s coworkers reported on the worsening traffic conditions around the Cape.
“Thanks, Pat, we’re standing on State Route four-oh-five, just east of the Indian River crossing, and as you can see as our cameraman pans over my left shoulder here, it’s become a parking lot. Now normally it would take a horrendous crash to shut down traffic flow like this, but tonight drivers hoping to catch a glimpse of the rescue launch began abandoning their cars on SR four-oh-five an hour-and-a-half ago because traffic stopped completely. We’re told by local news sources here that U.S. Highway 1 along the Indian River, the Bennett Causeway and the A1A along the Atlantic down through Cocoa Beach also are closed to through traffic, again due to cars being abandoned on roadways.”
People moved in behind the CNN reporter, smiling and cheering and holding up peace signs, trying to get on camera for a few seconds of fame.
“Everyone here is hopeful that the launch will occur soon. Most have been waiting for five hours or more, and so far no one’s complaining. They’re all just glad to be there. We’ve been told by several spectators that the very best viewing sites, well known to the locals here in Florida, began disappearing as early as five days ago. We’re keeping our fingers crossed for a successful launch tonight. Reporting live from State Route four-o-five, June Ridder, CNN news.”
“COUNTDOWN FOR ATLANTIS will resume on my mark,” came the announcement from the Kennedy Space Center’s control room. “Three, two, one, mark. T-minus-nine minutes and counting.”
The countdown clock located in the foreground of the press viewing area finally started moving. It had been stuck on nine minutes zero seconds for the past three hours and twenty-seven minutes.
“Where the hell is Stangley? The clock’s running again, get him in here dammit,” the producer yelled from CNN’s mobile production trailer at the Kennedy Space Center.
Stangley was just a few booths down talking with his colleagues, so it wasn’t long before the message reached him. He jogged the 20 yards or so then burst up the stairs into CNN’s booth. His producer looked up at him but said nothing.
“What?” Stangley said, sensing an attitude from his producer. “You know I’ve spent the past three hours rehashing the same crap over and over, waiting for the clock to restart,” Stangley said, trying to cover his embarrassment over missing the clock restart. “Then I finally step out for some fresh air and a soda,” he continued while scrambling to his seat, “I’m gone what, ten minutes, and the clock starts again. Didn’t we get a heads up from NASA for the restart?” Two production assistants looked at him but said nothing as they checked his hair and dabbed his forehead with a small white cloth to cut the shine.
Stangley unbuttoned the cuffs of his light-blue oxford button-down and flipped them back two turns. He quickly fastened his lapel mike, then took his earpiece from one of the assistants.
“John, I need a level,” the producer said into Stangley’s earpiece.
“Check, check,” Stangley fired back. “I’m ready.”
“Okay you’re on in ten, nine… Oh and by the way, John,” his producer added, “NASA didn’t ask us if we were ready before restarting the clock.”
Stangley smiled and nervously moved his shuttle models on the desk in front of him. In his earpiece he heard the producer continue her count, “four… three… two… one,” then her voice stopped, and a finger just off camera pointed to him.
“Welcome back to CNN,” Stangley said, shifting forward in his chair. “We’re coming to you live from the Kennedy Space Center along Florida’s Space Coast. We continue now with our live coverage of NASA’s historic shuttle launch, NASA’s gallant effort to rescue Columbia’s crew of seven. It’s a little after eleven P.M. here in Cape Canaveral. It’s been a long journey, over twenty days now since we first learned about Columbia’s damaged wing. America has spent the past three weeks following the day-to-day lives of the astronauts on Columbia, meeting the four-person crew of Atlantis and learning about their expedited training. All the wondering and waiting has come down to right now. Just a minute o
r so ago, the countdown clock for Atlantis resumed and now we’re less than nine minutes from launch. We have a split screen now showing the countdown clock. We are T-minus-seven-minutes-eighteen-seconds from launch now. All the hard work of the ground crews and astronauts and engineers over the past twenty days—and the countless prayer vigils held during that time throughout the country and even abroad—all that effort brings us to this point, just a few minutes from launch. Everyone here, of course, is very optimistic. But we must keep in mind how difficult it is to get the shuttle off the ground in the first place, and how much more difficult when the process has been rushed.”
In CNN’s production booth, monitors showed multiple camera views, but what was going out to America and the world over the TV feed was a multi-split screen of Stangley, the countdown clock and the shuttle on the launch pad.
“There are no more planned holds for Atlantis,” Stangley said. “If all goes well the clock will count down all the way to launch without stopping again, and Atlantis will be on her way. If something happens between now and T-minus-zero minutes, some problem that forces NASA to scrub this launch, keep in mind that NASA still has two more launch windows, one tomorrow night, and again the following night. Let’s listen in to Mission Control…”
NASA Announcer (Mike Sinter): T-minus-five minutes and counting. Less than five minutes now from the launch of Atlantis and her crew of four.
Launch Control: Atlantis you’re go for APU start.
Rivas: Roger go for APU start.
NASA Announcer: Pilot Edward Rivas now flipping the three switches on the flight deck of Atlantis to start each of the APUs or Auxiliary Power Units.
Launch on Need Page 21