Watching Columbia at rollout
by Alan Wood
March 30, l998
[Editor's note: Rollout is the point at which a crawler-transporter
moves the fully assembled Space Shuttle, mounted on a Mobile Launcher
Platform from the Vehicle Assembly Building to the launch pad. The
Crawler moves about 1 mile per hour over the approximabely 4.2-mile
trek on the 130 foot wide crawlerway.]
One morning during rollout a collegue came in and said "If you
guys hurry you can see STS-90 being rolled out from the VAB to PAD
39B". We hurried, it took 10 minutes to get there and for some reason
it wasn't moving, it was stopped on the crawlerway. It was so amazing
to see it sitting there and to be able to get so close. There is
no other time when you can see the orbiter attached to the rockets
without anything else around it.
Columbia, the oldest orbiter of the fleet, looks somehow prehistoric
and futuristic at the same time. Perhaps it's the ancient manatee
shape of it, or the discoloration and marks of a well and long used
vessel.
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