Space is closer than I dreamed of....
It all started with a tweet. Don't most things these days? Okay maybe it started a little further back. Yes from an early age I was enthralled with space and NASA. Once I was a teenager I realized I would not have the right stuff, my eyes, and gave up on my dreams of being an astronaut. I did make my way into an engineering field and have always followed what is going on in aviation, space and with NASA.
Enter twitter: a true geek's dream. Now I could follow and even interact with people at NASA and other people with similar space interests. And that is how it started. One day a tweet caught my attention. NASA was inviting people to participate in a tweetup for the upcoming SDO launch and 15 entrants would be selected to participate in person at Kennedy Space Center.
To be honest, I did not believe in a million years I would be selected, but I still filled out the form. To my shock, I received an email from NASA, letting me know that I had been selected as one of the 15 twitter correspondents! SDO is scheduled to launch on 2/10/10. Oh and if this is not already blow your socks off cool, Endeavor is scheduled to launch on 2/7/10. Really the opportunity not only to participate in the SDO launch, but the opportunity to see a shuttle launch!
Obviously a lot is subject to change, because launches are often delayed, etc, but if everything goes as planned here is the schedule that I have been given by NASA for my trip:
02/06/10 Travel to Titusville, Florida where my hotel is
02/07/10 4:39 AM EST Endeavor launch
02/08/10 All day twitter correspondent activities for SDO
02/09/10 Twitter correspondent activities and SDO launch
There are also many local tweetups scheduled. Check out this website to see where they are. Also make sure to follow the #SDOisGO hashtag.
SDO is on twitter at http://twitter.com/NASA_SDO
To learn more about the Solar Dynamics Observatory, SDO, check out the homepage.
