The interesting part (first time successfully landing on a barge) with sound
https://streamable.com/pwtye

Yeah, I started with that one but chose the one with better resolution and two different engines. Unfortunately there was no sound.

I didn't know whether to be happy or sad. Like seeing your mother-in-law drive off a cliff in your new car.

Okay, folks. History is converging here through six degrees of separation.

Long story. I think it is worth your time.

I grew up with a father who said terribly racist things, the n- word, disparaging remarks about all races. There was much screaming and bitter words from me for a lot of my childhood and well into my 20s.

After he died, I got into a short email exchange with someone I didn't know at all. A former co-worker of my father.

My dad's job, as I have said here before, was Range Safety Officer. His job was to blow up missiles that went off course. (No person has blown up more missiles, and no one will ever catch up to him, since they know how to do it now.)

In my email exchanges with "Teddy", I find out slowly that Teddy is a woman. The first woman in the Range Safety Flight arena. She tells me that she was treated horribly in those early days. Except for three of her co-workers, who mentored and helped her.

One of those men was my father.

Oh.

And then she reveals that she is Hispanic.

Dang.

So my dad talked nasty at home, and acted MORE THAN honorably at work. I wish I had known that when he was alive.

Then she tells me that her daughter became an engineer also, and is currently working in Range Safety.

Wow.

Fast forward to last week. I watch Hidden Figures, the movie about black women helping in the first manned space launches. They were in Langley VA, while my dad was stationed in Cape Canaveral, not NASA but the Air Force, working on unmanned missions. But still. It all came flooding back to me -- how my dad was one of the good guys. (It was also cool to see all the actual news footage of people on the beach and parades and what-all -- I was there with my family, doing those things.)

This reminded me of Teddy. I sent her an email, telling her that I was reminded of her story and how touched anew I was.

Then the Falcon 9 launch happened. This launch on this video.

The next day, I got a response from her. Here is her email to me, lightly edited:

Thank you so much for thinking of me. The 60's were a time quite different than today. This morning It came to me just how far we women have come since then.

I stood on the balcony of my house and watched the launch of a Falcon Rocket take off in all its glory from Vandenberg knowing my daughter was the Lead Flight Safety Analyst on that mission. For the last couple of months I have listened to her tell me about all the problems she has had to deal with in preparing all the destruct lines, impact limit lines and all the other things that go into getting the mission package ready for launch and knowing what she was talking about. Boy, was I jealous. I really miss being in the middle of all that. I was/am very PROUD of my little girl being part of the missions leaving out of Vandenberg and knowing I played a small part in making all that happen just like those ladies in Hidden Figures. I have not seen the movie yet but my friends and I are looking forward to it coming to Lompoc so I can see it

Your Dad would be surprised to learn that most of the new Flight Safety Analysts are now all women.