endeavour flyover

The shuttle Endeavour did a low flyover of Tucson this morning on its way to museum status in LA. They did it to honor Gabby Giffords and her husband, Mark, who was the shuttle's last pilot. 

With a friend's reminder text and a stroke of luck, I ran outside just in time to see it go past my school.

I had no idea how low 1,500 feet actually is (absurdly low!) and how exciting it would be to see it so close.

I didn't get my camera functioning in time to capture it, but one of my students did: 

And this much better quality shot was taken from just over the mountain you see in the picture above, by a friend of a friend whose name I don't know:

It's nice, when I so often feel fed up with the way our country functions, to see something so awe-inspiring and so positive.