Talking about space with an astronaut is a thrilling experience. While
visiting the
Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, we got to chat with Space Shuttle commander, Bruce Melnick. He flew on 2
Space Shuttle missions and knows a lot about the space program. He met us at
the front gate and escorted us to the Space Shuttle Atlantis attraction. We
set up the shot right in front of the full size solid rocket boosters. The
exhibit was amazing. We got to spend an hour with Bruce before the park
opened, and he enjoyed telling us all about the Kennedy Space Center Visitor
Complex. We got a full tour from Planet Play to the Rocket Garden to Heroes
& Legends to the Vehicle Assembly Building and concluding at the Saturn V
Complex. We really enjoyed our day at KSC but next time we are taking two days
to see everything.
Watch the full RV There Yet? episode -
Vacation Paradise
featuring our visit to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. Click the
video below to
watch the full interview with Astronaut Bruce Melnick.
If you don't watch the full interview, here's the transcript for you read. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex - this place is awesome. I mean you
can only see a very small percentage of what this place has to offer, but I
tell people when they come here that you need to take at least two days
here. You can't see everything that's here in just one day. This is where
the Space Shuttle Atlantis is which is kind of like our marquee exhibit
here. It actually houses the Space Shuttle Atlantis that flew in space 33
times, and out here in front of it, that's a full-scale external tank with
solid rocket boosters, and of course, that's what gives you all the
propulsion and all the fuel for the Space Shuttle to go fly in addition to
the three engines on the Space Shuttle. But that exhibit right there, when
you go inside and take a look at Atlantis. It'll put a tear in your eye.
When you walk up the ramp Kevin, you're going to go through a show that's
going to talk about the development of the Space Shuttle and how it all came
to fruition, and then you're going to go into another room and go through.
Some of it's almost like a three-dimensional shuttle launch experience
inside, and then you're going to see the shuttle behind a curtain, and then
when the curtain raises, you're actually going to be right in front of
Atlantis. And when you walk in there's not just the Space Shuttle which is
what you're going to focus on but there's a Hubble Space Telescope in there.
There's a lot of exhibits where you can see inside the cockpit of the Space
Shuttle. There's simulators downstairs where you can actually dock the space
shuttle to the Space Station. There's a lot in there.
I did not fly in Atlantis. I flew on the 11th flight of Discovery back in
1990. Very short mission just a four-day mission. We deployed a satellite
called Ulysses that went into a polar orbit around the sun, had to go to
Jupiter first but they're smart people to figure that stuff out. And then
in 1992 I flew on the very first flight of Endeavor which was really cool.
I was a helicopter test pilot and to be on a test flight of a Space
Shuttle. That's a whole different critter, and we were on what was
scheduled to be a seven day mission but we had some trouble in capturing
this satellite and attaching a new rocket motor to it so we ended up
extending the flight for nine days. Two great flights, this has been the
workhorse. There's never been a spaceship like it and when you think about
something that takes off and then can land like an airplane, I don't know
that we'll ever get there again because the most efficient way to get to
space is a capsule but when you need to carry huge payloads up and back to
space the Space Shuttle was the machine to do it. And to have one here.
One of only three ever is really special and the way it's displayed here.
There's another one up in Washington DC. There's another one out in
California but this is the best.
Tell us about the Rocket Garden?
That there is the history of human space flight. You start with a Mercury
Redstone which is the first rocket that Alan Shepard flew on which is the
one that I first heard about when I was in the sixth grade which inspired
me, and I said man I'd really like to do that. Then you've got the Gemini
Titan. You've got a Mercury Atlas there. You've got one of the
experimental early stages of the Saturn 1b there so pretty much the all of
the rockets that led up to human space flight are all there. There's even
some earlier flights that were just unmanned rockets that Mercury Vanguard
or Atlas Vanguard. There's other rockets there that led up to us feeling
like we were safe enough to fly humans in space.
Tell us about the Vehicle Assembly Building?
The VAB is legendary. Matter of fact it is so big it used to be the the
largest by volume building on the planet, but then Boeing, I think, passed
them up when building 747s, but it is so large and so much volume that it
actually creates its own weather in there. You can go inside the VAB which
is where we stacked the Saturn V rockets, and then we converted it to
stack the Space Shuttles in there and now we're stacking NASA's new space
launch system in there, so it's been a very versatile building. But it's
huge. I've actually seen fog form in there. I've seen rain form in there.
It's just a really neat building.
Tell us about the Saturn V Complex?
One of the things you need to do is hop on the bus here and take the tour
out to Saturn V. And one of the amazing things when you get to the exhibit
is you go through a show that talks about the space race and finally
getting to the moon, and then you can sit in the actual launch console,
the launch complex, the firing room with the consoles that actually
launched man to the moon, and go through the launch sequence, and then
when you walk out through the doors, you walk out right behind the bottom
first stage of the Saturn V. It's got its engines right there and you look
up, and it's like huge. We think the Space Shuttle external tank and solid
rocket boosters is huge, you look at that Saturn V. And then you walk
along the first stage, and then you walk the second stage, and then you
walk the third, I mean you walk forever till you get to the final tip top.
And you get to this little bitty capsule which is the only part that took
three men to the moon and back and that was the only part that came back
and to land in the ocean.
I stop whatever I'm doing whenever I know a launch is going up. It's just
such a dynamic experience and of course you can't get real close to them
and what to me Kevin is amazing is how you'll sit there and you'll see the
candle light, and you'll see the rocket go up, and you don't hear
anything, and then all of a sudden you start feeling this ground rumble,
and you feel it and you hear it and you just experience a whole launch and
just watch it through staging. It's exciting especially the human space
flight launches you know I still get a tear in my eye whenever I see one
of those and I think us talking to Patrice earlier about how you know I've
had a tear in my eye for every launch that I've witnessed except for two
and that was the two I was sitting inside of. But what blows my mind is
that people don't even realize that we've had human beings permanently
living in space for 21 years now. I mean the space station has been
permanently inhabited since you know the year 2000, and the work that
they're doing up there and accomplishing up there, and the way they're
getting up there and the way we're sending cargo up there and people don't
even know that's going on and to me it's just amazing. I talked about the
international space station when I was selected as an astronaut in 1987. I
thought that I was going to be in the first group of space station
commanders. Well, as we know there's a lot of delays in the program but I
was excited about getting the space station the bad news is I was there
from 90 to 92 and we hadn't even flown to the Space Station Mir yet.
Would you go up to the Space Station?
So the short answer is yes. I'd love to go up and do a stint on the space
station. I think I could easily spend a year up there. It's not having
been there that's easy to say, but yeah I'd like to be doing that again.
That blows my mind that we can send something to Mars have it land and now
not only have it land but explore the surface of Mars but now we're flying
drones on Mars come on. I mean that's something that to me is still
science fiction, but it's amazing the brilliant people we have in this
country that can pull programs together like that and just be successful
all the time.
What is there to do for RVers on the Space Coast?
This whole area has got plenty for RVers. If you're going to watch a
launch, there's no place better than Jetty Park to sit on top of your RV.
Here at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center, we've got RV parking so
you can just drive your RV right here to the visitor complex and park your
RV and enjoy everything we have to offer here. We've got the whole Space
Coast here where there's plenty of fine dining. You've got surfing down in
Cocoa Beach. There's a lot to do here when you bring your RV and stay for
a while.
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