Space Shuttle Enterprise arrives in New York

moose135

After days of weather delays, the Space Shuttle Enterprise finally made the flight to New York this morning, arriving at Kennedy Airport on the back of a NASA 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. The combo made an aerial tour of the New York area, flying up and down the Hudson River, over the Statue of Liberty, with fly overs at all three major area airports, before finally landing at JFK.

1 - Initial fly over at Kennedy



2 - With a NASA T-38 chase plane watching, the SCA makes a low approach



3 - On approach for the full stop landing



4 - Passing the JFK Tower on short final

Richard

:jawdrop

Fantastic shots. Where were you shooting from?

DaddyO

These are excellent images Moose

I can only imagine how thrilling it must have been to be there in NYC and take the event in. Hell... I have goosebumps from shear emotion just thinking about it. Makes me a bit proud to be American again.
Something I haven't felt so keenly for quite sometime.

Glad you were at the ready to captures these fine pictures thumb Great job

slpollett

Awesome, awesome, awesome. You surely had a great spot to catch this.

Sherry

black mamba

Great work, John. You got yourself some dynamite pictures.

Tom

torags

that shot with the tower is fantastic...

David_S85

OHHHHH, you lucky dog, you.

Just to see that with your own eyes would be fantastic, but great pics, too. Wow.

Andy

Listening to the radio here in NY today, and not being able to be there, I was saying to myself "I hope Moose gets the shot!" You didn't disappoint

moose135

Thank you all so much. It was a cold and windy morning (more so on the edge of Jamaica Bay) but certainly worth it. I had been sweating out the weather delays this week, as I'm off to Charlotte for work in the morning, and would be gone if they waited until early next week for the flight. It was an amazing sight, one I'll never forget.

Richard, I was at Bayswater Park, on the shore of Jamaica Bay. It's right across from JFK, and one of our regular spotting locations, so I'm familiar with the conditions and what to expect shooting there. For the side-on shots, they were a little under a mile away from us, in the shot with the tower in the background, it's about 1 1/4 miles from us, so big glass comes in handy!

The tower shot is a classic view for me - I've shot Air Force 1, the various A380s, and others at that angle, as it places the shot at JFK, rather than just a plain sky background. When they announced Enterprise would be coming to New York, I expected they would use this particular runway, and that's the shot I had in mind all the time. Although I am a little partial to the shot with the T-38 chase plane, probably because I flew them in the Air Force back when...

And I really have to thank my boss - barely two months into a new job, and with all the postponements this week, she said "do whatever you need to do..." to get out to shoot it. All in all it was a great experience, and I'm still looking at the photos saying "How cool is that!"

GSPeP

Great pictures

denisegoldberg

These are fabulous!

--- Denise

MJRPHOTO

Hey Moose it was a pleasure to shoot with you yesterday.

MJRPHOTO

Can you tell I was standing right next to Moose

moose135

It was great to finally meet you, Mike! Glad everything worked out for the flight.