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(Photo by Coasternnews Media Inc.)
I was browsing through a blog a few days ago when a really cool picture (shown above) caught my eye. I liked how the reflection of the cloud in the middle and the flag on the right all came together nicely on the dark background with the scattered gold writing.
But the writing made me wonder about what the story of this was…the words looked like names and the whole structure reminded me a lot of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall. What was the story behind this giant wall with only a few names? And whose names were they?
Tracking The Sun
So it turns out this is a picture of the Space Mirror Memorial which was put up at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to honor astronauts who died while serving in the space program. The memorial is gigantic and made up of panels of black granite with names cut through the stone and filled with a substance that catches light and makes the names glow.
The huge structure was designed to follow the sun as it moved across the sky and has mirrors in the back to reflect sunlight through the names, an awesome sight to behold no doubt. But a few years after the memorial was built the tracking mechanism failed several times and there was an accident that caused major damage.
The estimated cost to get it up and running again was around seven hundred thousand dollars and so it was never repaired. Now it just sits in one spot all the time and floodlights provide artificial light to make the names glow.
Clouds In The Sky
The problems this memorial has faced seem a bit similar to some of the major problems that have plagued the space program: it’s too big, too many moving parts, too expensive to keep working the way it’s supposed to.
But just like the space program, even though the memorial is broken it’s still an awe-inspiring thing. And though it can no longer track the sun it’s polished granite beautifully mirrors the clouds and other elements in the sky as they move above it.
That’s the way I see it anyway, what do you think? Anybody here ever been to this memorial?
Props to Coasternnews Media Inc for the great picture :).
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I think it should do what it was designed to do – track the sun. These are some of the best engineers on the planet, surely they can learn from their mistakes and make improvements on the design. The problem is the shift in budget priorities. $700,000.00 doesn’t seem like anything compared to the billions spent in other areas that I could care less about.
When I visited Cape Canaveral (in Brevard County – whoooooo…. scary) and the Kennedy Space Center in the 1970′s, this wasn’t built yet. But I certainly enjoyed every aspect of that visit. I can still picture my Addidas track suit emblazened on the back with the patch I bought there. My mom had to practically tear that thing off of me.
The images are nice, but I think it’s a disgrace and insult to both those that died and those that designed it to let it only reflect a fraction of what it could be.
Krudler,
It a sad irony isn’t it, that the same kind of budget cuts which played a large part in the deaths of many honored by the memorial…are responsible for the memorial’s less than functional state.
Btw got any cool 70′s pics of Cape Canaveral??