Thursday, April 26, 2012

Where to watch for the Space Shuttle Enterprise

Update, 12:25 pm, Thursday 4/26/2012 - I'd still watch the NYC Aviation site for changes but it's actually looking pretty good. The latest update on the forum thread was an "it's on" announcement from NASA, and I also checked in with my stormchasing friend John Huntington (interesting rant about the Tupac "hologram" over there today, btw - I hadn't ever gotten the full story but was somehow intrigued by the references more pop-savvy friends of mine had made on Facebook, so I enjoyed the explanation), who said " The winds are forecast to be pretty high, but they are forecast out of the NW, right down JFK's runway 31L... So my guess is it's still on". Being a weather geek as well as a control geek, his guess is usually good enough that I guess I'm going to go look at telephoto lenses for my Lumix after work tonight.

Weather permitting, we in the NYC area are in for a treat tomorrow (Friday, 4/27). The Space Shuttle Enterprise is on her way to join the exhibits at the Intrepid Air Sea and Space Museum and she gets flown in piggybacked on a 747 tomorrow. Prior to landing at JFK, they'll do a low-level circuit over NY, flying past the Statue of Liberty, up the Hudson to the Tappan Zee, back down to Manhattan, finishing with a big loop out over New Jersey, back over Long Island and then on down to JFK on the shores of Jamaica Bay. There's a great map of places to watch (kayak not required!) on nycaviation.com; they also give links to a Twitter feed where you can get the latest; for us non-tweety types, there's also a link to the thread on the site's forum where the plane folks are watching the situation closely and I bet any changes in schedule will be up there minutes after they are announced. Do keep an eye on the site if you're making plans to watch this tomorrow, from the talk on the forum it does sound like the winds may be a problem...

Shoot, in fact I just looked at NOAA & the forecast has gone from winds around 20 kts up to "Windy, with a northwest wind around 26 mph, with gusts as high as 36 mph"...that doesn't sound good at all.

Well, whenever it happens, I'm planning on watching from my office in SoHo, where I think we'll have a decent view. Not only do I have permission to go up to the roof in the morning, but my bosses are both bummed out that they are out of the office (won't they be happy if it's postponed)!

Might have to go buy a telephoto lens for the Lumix for this one! :D

Thanks to Going Coastal and the Working Harbor Committee for doing a great job with the links & updates on Facebook!

2 comments:

John Huntington said...

It's still on as of 20 minutes ago: https://twitter.com/#!/IntrepidMuseum/status/195546489190223872

bonnie said...

yep, looking good.

I actually just went up to the cafeteria for lunch & realized there's a high wall on exactly the wrong side - the view is more downtown, not as good as I was thinking although there's certainly a bit of section where we'd see the sky over the Hudson. May head over to the Hudson River Park or Battery Park instead.