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WELCOME TO THE SPACE GALLERY Images, Fan Art, and More!

*** WELCOME TO THE GALLERY!!! *** All images from NASA (public domain - your tax dollars at work!) *** Fan art by ME (Commander Dave) *** Don't forget to sign the guestbook!!! ***

EARTHRISE FROM THE LUNAR SURFACE This is what the astronauts saw when they looked up from the Moon. The Earth, hanging in pure blackness. Just... floating there. Our entire world - every person, every city, every ocean, every mountain - all on that one little blue marble. Jim Lovell saw this during Apollo 8 AND Apollo 13 (from orbit, since they couldn't land). He said he could cover the entire Earth with his thumb held at arm's length. Think about that for a second. EVERYTHING YOU'VE EVER KNOWN, hidden behind your thumb. I think about this image every single night when I look at my glow-in-the-dark stars on my bedroom ceiling. Someday I want to see this for real. Someday. Photo: NASA

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NASA MISSION CONTROL, HOUSTON TX This is where the magic happens. Gene Kranz and the flight controllers worked here during every Apollo mission. Every console had a specific job - FIDO (Flight Dynamics Officer), GUIDO (Guidance Officer), RETRO (Retrofire Officer), EECOM (Electrical, Environmental, and Communications), CAPCOM (Capsule Communicator - always an astronaut!), TELMU, GNC, INCO... I know ALL the callsigns! During Apollo 13, this room was full of people working around the clock for FOUR DAYS straight trying to bring the crew home. Some of them didn't sleep for 72 hours. Gene Kranz and his White Team came up with the procedures that saved the crew's lives. When someone told him "this could be the worst disaster NASA's ever had," he said "With all due respect, sir, I believe this is going to be our finest hour." AND HE WAS RIGHT. Someday I'm going to visit Johnson Space Center. Dad says maybe next summer? PLEASE DAD. Photo: NASA/Johnson Space Center

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THE MIGHTY SATURN V 363 feet tall. 7.5 MILLION pounds of thrust. The loudest thing humans have ever created. Windows broke 3 miles away during launch. Birds flying nearby were literally knocked out of the sky by the sound waves. The ground shook like an earthquake. The Saturn V could put 260,000 pounds into low Earth orbit. That's like launching 20 school buses into space at once. The first stage burned through 15 TONS of fuel per second. PER SECOND!!! It's basically the coolest machine ever invented. I have a poster of the Saturn V on my wall next to my bed. Mom wanted me to put up a poster of a basketball player or something "normal" but I told her the Saturn V IS normal. Normal for a future astronaut, anyway. Photo: NASA/Kennedy Space Center

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APOLLO 13: SAFE AT LAST After 87 hours of terror, cold, and darkness... they made it home. April 17, 1970. When the capsule hit the blackout zone during reentry, nobody could talk to the crew for four minutes. Normally blackout lasts three minutes. That extra minute of silence... the entire world held its breath. Mission Control went dead quiet. You could hear a pin drop. And then... "Okay, Joe." Jim Lovell's voice. They were alive. They were HOME. When you see those parachutes open, that's when I start crying. Every. Single. Time. 347 times and counting. Mom says I need to stop keeping count. I say she needs to stop cutting onions while I'm watching the movie. (She wasn't cutting onions. I was just crying. I'm not ashamed.) Photo: NASA/U.S. Navy

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THE ODYSSEY: APOLLO 13 COMMAND MODULE This brave little spacecraft brought Lovell, Swigert, and Haise home. She was damaged, frozen, and running on almost no power. But she held together. The Odyssey took everything space could throw at her and she STILL brought her crew back safely. When they powered her back up for reentry, nobody knew if the heat shield had been damaged by the explosion. If it had, the crew would have burned up on reentry. They wouldn't have even known. But the Odyssey's shield held. Because of COURSE it did. She wasn't going to let her crew down. (Yes, I talk about the spacecraft like she's a person. BECAUSE SHE IS.) The Odyssey is currently on display at the Kansas Cosmosphere in Hutchinson, Kansas. It's the most complete collection of space artifacts outside the Smithsonian. You can see the actual capsule that Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert, and Fred Haise rode home in. (Mom, can we go? PLEASE???) Photo: NASA

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MY SPACE DRAWINGS by Commander Dave (age 14, aspiring artist... sort of) Okay, I know I'm not a great artist, but I drew these in art class and Mrs. Patterson said they showed "real enthusiasm!" (I think that's teacher code for "your drawings are bad but you tried really hard" but I'm choosing to take it as a compliment.) Drawing #1: My drawing of the Saturn V launch. It looks more like a pencil on fire but you get the idea. I used three different shades of orange crayon for the exhaust plume. Mrs. Patterson said the flames were "very dynamic." Mike said it looked like a carrot having a bad day. Drawing #2: Apollo 13 crew portrait. Mike said Jim Lovell looks like a potato, but I think it's pretty good. Jack Swigert's hair turned out okay at least. Fred Haise kind of looks like a triangle with a face. I'M WORKING ON FACES, OKAY? Drawing #3: The Earth from space. This one actually turned out okay! I used watercolors and the blue swirled into the white in a way that actually looks like clouds over ocean. Even Mike said it was "not bad." From Mike, that's basically the Pulitzer Prize. If you want to see them, email me at commander_dave@geocities.com! (Don't actually email me, my dad checks that account and I don't want him to know how many people I've given our email address to. He already had to deal with that one time I signed up for 14 different space newsletters.)

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SIGN MY GUESTBOOK! Leave a message and let me know you were here! Mike - February 12, 1996 Cool page Dave! The rocket gif is awesome. See you at Space Club tomorrow. Also you still owe me that Surge from last week. Mom - February 14, 1996 Great job sweetie! Very proud of you. Don't forget to do your homework before working on this tonight. Your father and I love you very much. Also dinner is at 6. Love, Mom SpaceRanger99 - February 20, 1996 Found your page through the space webring. Apollo 13 rules! Have you seen the documentary "For All Mankind"? It uses actual NASA footage and it's AMAZING. Check it out! Also your missions table is really well done. Keep up the great work! AstroBoy2000 - March 1, 1996 Nice site! But Star Wars is still better than Apollo 13 sorry dude :P Han Solo > Jim Lovell fight me Commander Dave - March 1, 1996 @AstroBoy2000 - Apollo 13 is REAL LIFE which automatically makes it better. FACTS. Han Solo flew through a fictional asteroid field. Jim Lovell navigated a crippled spacecraft 200,000 miles back to Earth using MATH. No contest. Also Han Solo would never have survived Apollo 13 because he would have panicked. Lovell didn't even raise his voice. FACTS x2. Mrs. Henderson - March 5, 1996 David, this is wonderful! I can see you put a lot of research into your missions page. The attention to detail is impressive. Extra credit for web design! See me after class on Monday. (Also, please stop correcting other students when they say "Houston, we have a problem" - the actual quote IS important but you don't need to bring it up EVERY time.) WANT TO SIGN THE GUESTBOOK? To sign my guestbook, email commander_dave@geocities.com with your name and message! Please include: 1. Your name (or screen name) 2. Your message 3. Your favorite Apollo mission (OPTIONAL but highly encouraged) I'll add your entry within 48 hours! (Unless it's a school night, then maybe 72 hours. Mom's rules.)

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COOL SPACE LINKS Commander Dave's hand-picked collection of the best space sites on the World Wide Web! NASA Homepage - www.nasa.gov THE best website on the entire internet. Not even close. I check it every day after school. They have mission archives, photo galleries, and educational resources. If you only visit ONE link on this page, make it this one. Jet Propulsion Laboratory Amazing pictures from space probes! They run all the unmanned missions - Voyager, Galileo, Mars Pathfinder (launching NEXT YEAR!!!). The images from Jupiter are unbelievable. Space Camp - Huntsville, Alabama I'm going this summer! FINALLY! After two years of begging, Mom and Dad said yes! I'm doing the Advanced Space Academy program. They have REAL simulators and you get to do a simulated shuttle mission. I literally cannot wait. 127 days and counting. The Space Ring Webring Tons of other space pages by people like me! This is how I found SpaceRanger99's page. There are over 200 sites in the ring. If you like MY page, you'll find a lot more to love here. Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex We went here last year on vacation. INCREDIBLE. They have a real Saturn V laying on its side and you can walk under it. It's SO BIG. I stood there with my mouth open for like 10 minutes. Dad has a photo of me just staring up at it looking like a goldfish. Best day of my life. Mike's Dinosaur Page Not space related but he's my best friend so I'm linking it. Mike is really into dinosaurs the way I'm into space. His page has some cool drawings of T-Rex and Velociraptors. He's actually a good artist unlike me. (Don't tell him I said that.)

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WESTFIELD MIDDLE SCHOOL SPACE CLUB Official Update - March 1996 Members: Commander Dave (President and Founder) Mike (Vice President and Chief Dinosaur Consultant) Mom (Honorary Treasurer - she buys the snacks) Next Meeting: Saturday 3pm at my house. We're building an Estes model rocket! It's the Alpha III with a C6-5 engine. If the weather is good we'll launch it in the field behind the school. If the weather is bad we'll watch Apollo 13 again. (Mike says we've watched it too many times. There is no such thing as too many times.) Recent Accomplishments: Completed scale model of the International Space Station (it's hanging in my room!) Wrote letters to THREE astronauts (still waiting to hear back... any day now...) Recruited zero new members this semester (we put up flyers but nobody came to the meeting. Their loss.) Club Motto: AD ASTRA PER ASPERA (Through difficulties to the stars) New members welcome! (Seriously. Please. We need more members so the school will give us a real meeting room instead of the janitor's closet.)

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Back to Home | GeoCities Cape Canaveral | GeoCities Home Thanks for visiting! You are visitor #001,203 Gallery last updated: March 12, 1996 All NASA images are public domain Fan art is (c) 1996 Commander Dave (David Chen). All rights reserved. (Not that anyone would want to steal my drawings but just in case) This page is best viewed in Netscape Navigator 3.0 at 800x600 resolution AD ASTRA PER ASPERA "Through difficulties to the stars"