Mr. Kranz & I

[Coops]

So last Thursday night I got to meet one of my hero's, Mr. Gene "Failure Is Not An Option" Kranz. This was a thrill that is indescribable. It was a surprise from my mother in law, she bought my wife and I tickets to the annual Lunar Rendezvous "movie night" and what did we get? One hour of Gene Kranz speaking of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions with special coverage of Apollo 13. It was so freaking incredible to sit there and hear it from him instead of watching "Apollo 13" again. Mr. Kranz has been a personal hero of mine for quite a while and this will be something I'll never, ever forget. I had a personal laugh when, in the middle of his speech, he explained that Mission Control at that time lived off of a diet of "black coffee, cigarettes, and prayer." A great man, one hell of an American. Meeting him to me was equal or even better than meeting TS. Sorry, but I have a very soft spot in my heart for the space program, especially Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gene_Kranz

[Olivier]

Meeting him to me was equal or even better than meeting TS

We can understand your emotion.

I' m not particularly interested by space missions but I was very happy when G.W. Bush announced new "trips" on the moon (2015-2020).

[SelleckLover]

Wow, Coops! Awesome. They just don't make 'em like Krantz anymore. I always thought it was kind of neat, but never really had an overwhelming interest in the space program, per se, but I worked at a job for 15 years that NEVER would have existed if it wasn't for the space program. That job paid for private school for my son, bought groceries, paid bills, bought cars and paid for medical insurance for my family. All because Mr. Krantz wouldn't accept failure as an option. He is a worthy and deserving recipient of your and anyone else's hero-worship.

[Coops]

What a lot of people fail to realise is how much the space program gave back in not just jobs but technologies. It was a huge mistake for Nixon to pull funding of the rest of the Apollo missions. That left NASA pretty much without a focus for 30 years. Since I live in the Clear Lake are, the home of Johnson Space Center, NASA and space exploration has been rooted in me. It's been a passion of mine since I was small and my father worked for G.E., at the time a sub-contractor for NASA.

[IslandHopper]

Very cool Coops. Living in Orlando, I get to see a lot of the space program. We have a time share on Coca Beach (45 minutes from Orlando) and the last two years we got to see the Shuttle go up while at Cocoa Beach. We can see it from Orlando too. Just the other day the Shuttle boomed (boom-boom) over our house on its way to Cape Canaveral for its return home. It shakes the entire house. It really freaks you out when it comes for a landing in the early morning hours. The first time that happened I thought someone drove a truck through the house. My dad went to high school with Astronaut John Young (Orlando High School). They remained friends throughout the years. He gave my dad an autographed photo of him walking on the moon.

My alma mater, University of Central Florida (UCF) also does a great deal with NASA. The engineering department anyway. I don't know about you, but I love the movies "The Right Stuff," and "Apollo 13."

[J.J. Walters]

Very cool Coops! The guy's a living legend!

I would have been tempted to say, "Hey, where's your vest big guy?"

[Steve]

Very cool.....I was (and am) a big fan of the space program especially during the Mercury/Gemini/Apollo days and have been watching "When We Left The Earth" on Discovery recapping those exciting days. I had the great honor of standing on The Causeway into the Cape and seeing Apollo 15 blast off when I was a teenager. I just missed the Shuttle go up in March when I was in Daytona Bach for Bike Week (by one day) but did ride down and see it on the Launch Pad. I get a kick out of the JPL Rover Missions and it alway bothered me that when a probe was landing and they would show the JPL folks, they were in a cubicle looking at a computer dressed in golf shirts and khaki's. This last mission I noticed they at least made a mini mission control room but they still looked like Best Buy employees. Give me the 26 year old kids in the horn rimmed glasses, starched white shirts and a genuine look of concern from the old days!!!LOL.

Steve
Chicago

[Coops]

Very cool Coops! The guy's a living legend!

I would have been tempted to say, "Hey, where's your vest big guy?"

If you are watching "When We Left Earth" on the Discovery Channel you'll see Gene wearing the same vest he wore during his presentation; the Apollo XIII vest. When the presentation was over a couple of NASA reps removed the vest to take it back to their museum/historic items storage area. It was the exact same vest he wore during the mission. Was AWESOME!

[Coops]

Very cool Coops. Living in Orlando, I get to see a lot of the space program. We have a time share on Coca Beach (45 minutes from Orlando) and the last two years we got to see the Shuttle go up while at Cocoa Beach. We can see it from Orlando too. Just the other day the Shuttle boomed (boom-boom) over our house on its way to Cape Canaveral for its return home. It shakes the entire house. It really freaks you out when it comes for a landing in the early morning hours. The first time that happened I thought someone drove a truck through the house. My dad went to high school with Astronaut John Young (Orlando High School). They remained friends throughout the years. He gave my dad an autographed photo of him walking on the moon.

My alma mater, University of Central Florida (UCF) also does a great deal with NASA. The engineering department anyway. I don't know about you, but I love the movies "The Right Stuff," and "Apollo 13."

If you liked Apollo 13 then From The Earth To The Moon is a must! But I'll assume you already knew that!