Friday’s Crew-11 launch draws crowds to Cape Canaveral

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Despite the heat, large crowds of people gathered Friday at places like Port Canaveral’s Jetty Park to watch the Crew 11 launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Some of them came for the second day in a row after Thursday’s launch was scrubbed.

Once the countdown got within 1 minute Friday, people got out of their chairs and started to look over the water. Their phones were out, and their heads tilted toward the sky for the big moment.

Several minutes after the rocket took off, the first-stage booster landed back at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Landing Zone 1, and then, family, friends and strangers shared a round of applause.

People at Jetty Park told Spectrum News they were from Orlando, Ocala, Tampa and all over Florida.

But not everyone traveled as far.

“We just love watching the launches,” said Brian Rodriguez, who lives in Melbourne. “I grew up here in Florida as a child. My dad worked on the Apollo program. We were out there to watch the launches.”

Rodriguez has seen hundreds of launches in his life.

“The launches themselves — the sound, the feeling on launches like this one when the booster comes back to landing — it is just amazing,” he said. “I recommend to everyone to at least do it once.”

For others, it was a first experience. The Hendricks family were on vacation in Florida from the Netherlands and moved their schedule around to be at Jetty Park, not one day but two, to finally see the send-off.

“It was spectacular, I have to say…amazed and really loving it,” Bastiaan Hendricks said.

Others made a shorter drive from Winter Springs.

“He is the one who came up with the idea of getting up at 5 o’clock (a.m.) so we could be out here early because it gets kind of crazy,” said Desirree Bauman, looking at the guy she came with. “There is a lot of people that want to see this, so we need to get up at 5 o’clock, and I said OK, let’s get up at 5.”

It was an early morning and a day of sweltering sun, but all worth it to witness the send-off to space.