John Glenn back in space after 36 yrs

But the launch itself went according to script with a perfect lift off and the two booster rockets separating to form a triad etched against a blue sky.Despite space shuttle launches becoming commonplace in the 1990s, commentators, observers, spectators and even former astronauts said it was a stirring sight.

“It’s hard not to be moved by thespectacle,” former shuttler Scott Carpenter said in his commentary. “One never really gets used to it.”

The launch became all the more special because of a special passenger. John Glenn, 77, was the first American to orbit Earth 36 years ago in 1962 when Space Age was still in its infancy. The feat made him an all-American hero and propelled him to a political career which has seen him in the US Senate since 1972.

(Indian readers would also be familiar with his name because of the Glenn Amendment, a law he drafted to punish with severe sanctions countries which overtly crossed the nuclear threshold.) Glenn’s return to orbit has engendered renewed interest in space travel which has lost much of its sheen in recent times because of mankind’s inability and unwillingness to breach any new frontier after landing on the Moon and the modest scope and range of space travel.

Since the dawn of the Space Age in the late 1950s, some 400 men and women — including one Indian and an Indian-American — havetravelled in space. Since the manufacture of the reusable space shuttle, the US itself has flogged it 92 times in course of launching 123 manned space missions.

After a flurry of moon landings starting 1969 into the early 70s, humankind has shelved manned exploration of other planetary bodies, and not even undertaken a manned exploration of Mars, the planet nearest and most similar to Earth. In the 1980s, space travel began to be considered too expensive and rather useless not value for money. NASA went into decline.

But the thrill is back, even if it is momentary and artificial. Despite reducing what was once a exciting event to the mundane, NASA’s Glenn mission has attracted unprecedented attention fuelled partly by what some say is the space agency’s self-serving publicity machine, and the news media’s unsatiable hunger for news and audience.

President Bill Clinton himself made his way to Cape Canaveral to witness the launch. Some 80 of Glenn’s legislative colleagues — Senators and Congressmen –were in attendance. Hollywood glitterati led by teenage idol Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks and Bruce Willis turned up. And close to 4,000 journalists were reporting on the event.

But most of all, some 300,000 people crowded the fields and knolls besides US Highway 1 and the launchpad to see the historic event, jamming the area. Internet sites featuring the launch — CNN, NASA, JPL — all saw heavy traffic as millions logged on.

In all the excitement, Discovery’s mission itself has taken a backseat as also its crew of six other astronauts — four Americans, a Japanese and a Spaniard. During its nine-day journey round the Earth, the crew will perform 83 experiments including studies on aging in which Glenn will be the focus.