hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr4040.txt

Episode: 4040
Title: HPR4040: Further Into Florida
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr4040/hpr4040.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-25 18:55:40

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 4040 for Friday the 26th of January 2024.
Today's show is entitled, Further Into Florida.
It is part of the series Travel.
It is hosted by Ahukad and is about 15 minutes long.
It carries a clean flag.
The summary is.
We continue our Florida journey and hit the Kennedy Space Center.
This is Ahukad, welcoming you to Hacker Public Radio and another exciting episode in our
ongoing tale of our V-travels.
So, we were leaving Panacea, Florida last time and now we move further into Florida on
the 20th of January.
We made an overnight stop at a place called Lake City and there is a Lake City campground.
We had a reservation.
We found the campground but there was no one on duty.
Well we had a reservation.
There was one empty spot so we just pulled into it and set up.
There was no one answering the phone.
The voicemail box was full and not accepting any more messages.
The next morning nothing had changed so I went into RV trip wizard and found that the
three previous people who left reviews had all been charged $20 for a one night stay.
So I wrote a check for that amount and then we hit the road.
So on the 21st having written the check we left Lake City and we drove to a town called
Mims which is just a few miles from the Kennedy Space Center where we stayed at the Titusville
Kennedy KOA RV camp.
We were welcomed by nice friendly people which I expected since this is a KOA campground.
Now for those of you who aren't familiar with KOA it stands for campgrounds of America
and yes they're spelling campgrounds with a K you know because that's what the cool
kids do I guess.
But it is a slightly more upscale and slightly more expensive option but it was the best
option we had for for this particular stay.
Then it was a nice place so by just after two o'clock we were in our space and set up.
Now I checked the Kennedy Space Center site and there are tons of things to do there.
I think we could spend four days there easily and looking at the admission charges it makes
sense for us to purchase annual passes if we do that.
I'm getting excited here.
This is something I've been looking forward to for a long time.
So the next day on the 22nd of January after breakfast we headed to the Kennedy Space Center.
Now they offer one day and two day passes but after checking out the price you know the
annual pass was barely more than the price of a two day pass.
So it made sense to purchase annual passes we're going to be using them enough plus we
get free parking and discounts on merchandise.
So we bought our passes and decided to start with the bus tour.
Now this is an included tour with our passes.
They have other tours that cost extra and after viewing some of the structures like the
vehicle assembly building and the crawler that takes the rockets to the launch pad we
were dropped at the Apollo Saturn V building and we started with a movie.
We saw the launch control center used for the Apollo 8 launch.
They had taken that and moved it over to this building.
Then we got to see a Saturn V rocket.
Now of course we also saw one in Huntsville and I think if you're only talking about
the Saturn V experience Huntsville actually did a better job in my opinion.
But we got to see a movie about the Apollo 11 moon landing.
Exhibits about the moon buggy and the actual capsule from Apollo 14.
Now as we stepped outside where there were spectator bleachers looking across at one
of the launch sites across the water.
Now there are newer launch sites than that but you wouldn't get into these bleachers
for those newer launch sites.
The idea is that observation they want to keep you back a good three miles.
Now there are several reasons for that.
And most important is a fully loaded Saturn V rocket has the explosive power of a nuclear
bomb if it blows up.
And even good launches are things you don't want to be too near to.
You can experience real problems at two or two and a half miles distance.
But it's not just the heat, it's the sound, the pressure, the number of concerns.
So basically they have observation places for various launch sites but they're always
located about three miles away.
Now they had the actual shuttle as well.
So when we finished at the Saturn V building we caught the bus to go back to the visitor
complex and they dropped us right in front of the space shuttle Atlantis exhibit.
And Atlantis is in the building, it's the actual shuttle.
And as before we started with a movie about the development of the shuttle before walking
around.
They removed the bay doors and had a mock-up of the flight deck you could walk through.
There was also a display of a full-size mock-up of the Hubble Space Telescope which of course
was delivered to orbit and then serviced multiple times by shuttle missions.
Then we had one of the best things of the day, a simulation of a shuttle take-off.
Now they couldn't replicate the G forces but otherwise it was very realistic in a great
experience.
After that we walked through a few displays but we were getting tired and needed to do
some grocery shopping on the way back.
So we ended day one of our Kennedy experience and left the Space Center.
Well, January 23rd, our second day at the Kennedy Space Center.
With the annual passes we bought we got free parking which helps.
We first inquired about the other bus trip that is not part of the pass.
There were supposedly two but one of them was not running at this point.
And I don't remember exactly why now if it had to do with COVID or what the problem was.
But there was one bus trip that required an extra charge but it looked good so we bought
tickets.
Then we went to the rocket garden.
Now this is by the entrance and it is basically an outdoor area where you've got a bunch
of different rockets set up kind of taking you through the history of it and there is
a docent there who is guiding the tour and explaining everything that you would see.
So that was a lot of fun.
Then we went into the gateway building and that is as far as I could tell primarily a showcase
for the outside companies that NASA is now purchasing from like SpaceX, United Launch Alliance,
Boeing and so on.
There looked to be some rides in there but we didn't have time for them so we thought well
we'll go back later and check them out.
From there we went to the iMac Theater to see Journey to Space 3D and that was fun.
Finally we got on the second bus tour.
Now this one had a guide the whole way and this is the one that would take you to places
you could get off the bus, you could walk around and have much more of an experience.
So it was a really good thing to do.
We visited an observation tower that was near LaunchPads 39A and 39B but you know the
fact that it was near them meant you couldn't watch a launch from either of those from this
particular location.
If a rocket were to blow up the guide said the resulting fireball would extend to about
three miles so NASA has a rule that no one can get any closer than three and a half miles
to observe a launch.
So this tower was used for farther away launches.
Then we went to a camera platform where NASA stations cameras to observe launches.
These are very high quality cameras and our guide said that from a mile away they could
read his name badge on his shirt.
Now we went by LaunchPads 39A and 39B and he noted the water towers on each pad and that's
actually a noise reduction measure.
The rockets can produce so much noise that they would shake the rockets to pieces.
So the water is dumped there at launch time for noise abatement.
So when you think you are seeing white smoke at a launch you are actually seeing a lot
of steam.
Then we went to the vehicle assembly building which is the largest one story building in
the world.
The different stages of the rocket are stacked together here.
Then the crawler goes and picks up the mobile launch tower and takes it to the vehicle assembly
building and the rocket is added by some very heavy duty cranes.
Then the whole shebang goes to the launch pad at an average speed of about half a mile
an hour and that's where the rocket and the mobile launch tower are dropped off.
The crawler goes to a holding area a little distance away and after the launch goes back
to get the mobile launch tower and take it back to the VAB area.
Now we got to see a lot of the NASA operations on this bus tour so I'm glad we did it.
They dropped us back at the Saturn V building but since we did that yesterday we just caught
the next bus back to the visitor complex and then went home.
Ok, January 24th, day three at the Kennedy Space Center started out with a return to
the Gateway building where we took a couple of rides.
One went to a different solar system where the planets were investigated and the second
took us to Mars.
They were both fantastic rides although brief at around five minutes each but with lining
up and getting belted in it took a little more than that.
So I recommend them highly.
Then we went to the IMAX theater to see a movie about Jean Sernin and the last Apollo
mission which was number 17.
It was called The Last Man on the Moon and now we've seen two of the IMAX movies available
here.
Following the movie we went back to the shuttle Atlantis building for the guided Atlantis
walk and it turned out our guide for this was the same fellow we had yesterday on the
guided bus tour.
We enjoyed them then and again today.
He gave us a lot more information about the shuttle and its components particularly
the heat tiles.
After that we went downstairs and watched videos of many of the people who worked on the
shuttle program each telling about their own experiences.
We loved it.
We finished off by taking in the presentation in the Journey to Mars building.
NASA is planning to send the first crewed mission to Mars by the end of the 2030s if I
followed it correctly and then it was time to go back to the RV.
January 25th, day for it Kennedy.
We arrived a bit earlier today so that we could be sure to catch the 3D IMAX movie Asteroid
Hunters which was all about scientists working in the Earth's protection field to protect
us from killer asteroids.
Then in the downstairs we found a Lego exhibit which was really for the kids but it was kind
of fun.
Then we went to the universe theater for a presentation called It's a Matter of Fact.
This was also a kids demonstration but we had fun with it.
Then after lunch we went back to the gateway building to do the remaining two rides.
One was about different stars and the other about Jupiter and Saturn.
They were just as much fun as the two we did previously.
Now we noticed that the shuttle Atlantis building had something called the Hubble Theater
which we had not seen so we went back there.
When we got to the theater area we found one of the guides relaxing while waiting to
do the guided shuttle Atlantis tour which we had done yesterday.
But we had a great time chatting with him before watching the movie then we went downstairs
to try our hands at the simulators but I have to say I found it frustrating.
There's a reason I don't play those kinds of computer games I'm no good at them.
Then to cap off the trip we did a repeat of the shuttle launch simulator and it was just
as much fun as before.
At that point we left did a little shopping and went back to the RV.
So this is a hookah for Hacker Public Radio signing off and as always encouraging you to
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