Official Shuttle Countdown clock

This is our group in front of the official shuttle countdown clock. Directly behind here is the press area. The families of the astronauts watch the launch from the 4th floor of the control building, which is to the left (not shown). The press used to be allowed to interact with the astronaut families, but immediately after the Challenger accident a reporter walked up to Christy McAuliffe's mom and said "It looks like your daughter just died . . ." and tried to get a story from her. So, now the press is not allowed in the launch control building where the families are. In the center of our group, you see Lisa Valencia, another education specialist similar to Les Gold. She is actually an electrical engineer who worked for NASA. She joined the education outreach program 5 years ago. Before that she developed ways to blow up rockets that go off course, did communications for the Mars rover, and other communications projects. So, if a rocket went off course and was headed towards Orlando, she and her group determined ways to blow up the rocket. She and her husband worked at NASA Langley. One day she was in Florida and wanted to look at transferring to the Kennedy Center. She went into the center and found a phone book. She tried calling lots of engineering managers but couldn't contact anyone. She finally called a director, which seems pretty crazy. He was very nice and asked her and her husband to come to his office. He hired them on the spot. They did a double transfer, with no salary loss. NASA paid for the move and everything. It appears that it was meant to be. She has good people skills and has been responsible for getting us in lots of places that tourists never get to go, and arranging fun tours for us that weren't on the original schedule. She helped get us into the final shuttle landing, and several more surprise tours that are coming up in 2 days.