Space flight launch

You may recall that we tried to watch a space launch from our campsite at Clerbrook Golf and RV resort a week or so ago with limited success: https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2023/01/spacex-launches.html

We had thought that we might have more success with a launch that was after dark, and Monday night's launch was scheduled for 11:50pm, well after dark... so we decided to try to see it. Earlier in the evening (about 8:30pm) we heard fireworks and had heard that we could possibly see Disney fireworks from our campground too... we looked, but there were trees to the east of us that pretty much obscured any fireworks viewing. We thought that our viewing of the SpaceX launch might have a similar problem, but it did not...

... we could actually see it quite well...

... unfortunately, we did not take the tripod with us...

... the camera was trying to do a long exposure...

... and we just couldn't hold it still enough!

The above photos were taken with Carl's camera (not the one on his phone, a separate camera).

Meanwhile, I took a few pictures with the camera on my phone:

It was also trying to keep the aperture open for a longer time...

... making the campground look really lit up...

... but you can see the rocket as it was clearing the trees and heading up...

... it was much brighter and more visible than we expected.

What we did not get a picture of and what was the most amazing to us was the first stage booster main engine cutoff, then separation and seeing the second stage light up - we could distinctly see the two objects split apart from each other, almost like the ship had exploded, but we could see each of them for a few seconds proceeding in their separate directions. The first stage darkened as it returned to land close to where the rocket took off but had an additional landing burn to slow it down as it was coming through the atmosphere, and we saw that too (that may be what the last picture that Carl took was showing). We couldn't see the final burn as it was nearing the ground (we watched it on my phone via the broadcast) as it was below the horizon for our location. But we were happy to see what we could, and were pleased that our decision to stay up past midnight was worth the cost!