News Story from Florida Today: Expo reaches for stars

November 2007 Inaugural event set for Visitor Complex


BY PATRICK PETERSON
FLORIDA TODAY


Preparation. Keith Miller, lead exhibit tech, prepares to replace the Plexiglas covering over the Vostok, a 1961 Russian spacecraft, on display this weekend at the World Space Expo at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. Rik Jesse, FLORIDA TODAY
 
Among the events
Air show: 1 to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday above the NASA Causeway
Back to the '60s Barbecue: 6 to 9 p.m. Friday, featuring Mercury astronauts John Glenn and Scott Carpenter
For ticket information: Call 449-4400.
 
CAPE CANAVERAL -- - More than a year in the planning, the first World Space Expo -- which includes a two-day air show -- already has sold 4,000 tickets, and will pull in tourists during a traditionally slow time of year.
"It takes a couple of years to really get it going," said Dan LeBlanc, chief operating officer of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.
The World Space Expo runs Thursday through Sunday.
Officials expect the air show, being held Saturday and Sunday, to draw 7,000 to 10,000 people.
"The air show for an event to draw people really appeals to us," LeBlanc said.
The emotional highlight of the Expo might be the performances by the Air Force Thunderbirds, but the educational peak of the weekend will be the experiences of about 3,000 Central Florida schoolchildren, who will learn about the space program by launching a weather balloon and studying a Russian space capsule.
Meanwhile, about 300 Girl Scouts will have a close interaction with female aerospace heroes, including retired Col. Eileen Collins, the first female space shuttle commander; and Maj. Samantha Weeks, the first female solo pilot for the Thunderbirds.
"We can meet many mission goals with this," LeBlanc said.
The Expo, sponsored in part by Space Florida, is associated with a Thursday conference of commercial space-industry investors and pioneers.
Some of those pioneers will have displays at the Visitor Center, including a full-sized model of Space Ship One, which won the $10 million X-Prize competition for reaching suborbital space.
 
Vostok Space Capsule on loan to Kennedy Space Center, courtesy of Kaller Historical