A Bright Dawn in a Dark Year: Space Shuttle Discovery, March 2001
- bcpix3
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
It was March 2001 and Space Shuttle Discovery stood poised for launch at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It was to be a very consequential year in many ways in my world. We were less than 3 weeks removed from Dale Earnhardt's fatal last lap crash in the 2001 Daytona 500 and less than 6 months away from the horrific attack on New York City's World Trade Center. This blast-off, a rare sunrise launch, would prove to be a bright spot in a year which will go down in history for some extraordinarily dark moments.
At the time I was covering the space shuttle launches for Agence France-Presse and my assignment for the recent launches was to leave the grounds of Kennedy Space Center and head into the communities along the Florida Space Coast in search of a postcard-like scene of spectators watching the shuttle's fiery ascent.
This was an assignment that I loved as it combined many challenging elements which, if successfully negotiated, could result in a unique photograph of a historical event.
I would usually depart the KSC Press Site an hour or two before the scheduled liftoff, which provided the first challenge: a concrete time fame. I always found it challenging to scour the normal go-to spots and see what promising subject matter was presenting itself, keeping in mind that you did not want to repeat the same photo launch after launch.
It also proved quite nerve-wracking when you found a great subject, maybe a family playing in the water of the Banana River with the family dog, and watch as a promising photo came together only to realize that the dog could run off chasing a frisbee or the kids might grow bored and wander out of the frame just seconds before blast-off ruining your picture perfect image.
Another aspect of the time constraint was the fact that it was only a matter of about a minute from the time to rocket engines lit up to the time that the shuttle had climbed into orbit, so you better make your photo in that time frame!
There was also the lighting and scenery to take into account in envisioning and lining up your photo. So I was pretty excited for this rare sunrise opportunity.
As an added challenge, this was the first space shuttle launch that I would be covering fully digitally, having recently purchased the new Canon 30D 3mp digital body. This was obviously before the days of iphone apps that told you exactly when and where the sun would appear above the horizon, so I was reduced to driving up and down US1 in Titusville with one eye on the glow on the horizon and the other eye on the clock as the time ticked down before the launch.
As the moment of liftoff approached I came upon a riverside park with a suitable gathering of shuttle watchers and an excellent array of silhouetted palm trees. I found a parking space, grabbed my gear, made a quick survey of the scene and formulated a list of possible shots in my mind.
The sun peeked over the horizon, the SRBs ignited and Discovery rose majestically space-ward. It was one of those moments that many photographers are familiar with, where you gasp as you watch through the viewfinder, knowing that the resulting images would be worth the effort.
In the years I spent covering NASA's shuttle launches, this particular one always stand out in my memory as one of those times when everything came together perfectly.
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