As I’ve said it’s been a busy few weeks; let’s hit the good stuff first.

Last weekend was the 20th Anniversary of the Challenger accident. No, that’s NOT the good stuff. The good part about it was the 2nd Annual Fleet Day at Kennedy Space Center. This is the second year that members of Starfleet International have gone as a group to Kennedy to honor the memories of all the fallen astronauts. This year coincided with the 20th anniversary and was even bigger than last year’s outing.

32 members of Fleet ended up showing for the major part of the weekend on Saturday. All dressed in either Star Trek costumes/uniforms, chapter t-shirts or Fleet paraphernalia we made an impressive looking group. Most were from around Florida with some traveling from Alabama, Kentucky and (he just happened to be in Florida at the same time) California. Once gathered together, we made our way to the Memorial Mirror for the official ceremony. This was a long drawn out parade of speakers ranging from the boring politicians and NASA bureaucrats to members of the Scobee family. Dick Scobee’s widow seemed to go on the longest; she seemed to wrap up three or four different times and then just kept going and going and going. Still, a very impressive and occasionally inspiring ceremony.

Starfleet became an unofficial part of the ceremony completely by accident. Kennedy Space Center was handing out individual flowers for visitors to leave at the Mirror. We brought a beautiful wreath for our own little ceremony after the official event was finished. The area directly in front of the mirror was blocked off for the ceremony so we placed the wreath off to one side to wait. As the ceremony dragged on some people decided not to stay. With gentle reverence, one by one, people started leaving flowers at the foot of our wreath apparently thinking that was part of the memorial. Within minuets there were hundreds of flowers blanketing the base of our wreath. TV crews filmed it and photos were taken by local media and Reuters. If only they knew.

For the remainder of the day everyone scattered on their own for the most part. Since I had taken the bus tour last year I mostly hung around the Visitors’ Center going through the different pavilions there. At the end of the day we had a group dinner at a local Friendly’s. Arrangements had been made for a group rate at a local hotel which held over about a third of the group to the next day.

On Sunday we visited the Astronaut Hall of Fame. A very impressive museum for anyone interested in the space program. The highlight for me was the g-force centrifuge. This was a smaller version of the one used to train astronauts. It spins you to simulate up to 4-g’s; not too bad actually.

A farewell lunch at a local buffet restaurant capped off the weekend. All in all; quite a success. Plans are already in the early stages for next year, which will be the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire. I am hoping for a repeat of this year’s success, if not something a little bigger.

Since I was the person who planned the event I was presented with a gift at the end in honor of my efforts. I was given a pin from the planets series sold in the gift shop. They had chosen the one planet which most reminded them of me…..URANUS.

It’s so good to have friends!