In Florida, end of space shuttle program hits hard

Three decades of human spaceflight driven by the iconic shuttle program have fueled growth in this Atlantic coast beach community, but the end of those glory days are hurtling closer with the final flight of Atlantis on Friday.

The last shuttle mission will trigger the disappearance of some 27,000 jobs either directly or indirectly tied to NASA\'s shuttle efforts, according to local officials.

"This is really like losing a family member," said Marcia Gaedcke, president of the Chamber of Commerce of the Titusville area, explaining that residents have experienced some of the well-known stages of grieving.

"We have gone through denial -- that it\'s not going to happen... and we got to anger that it is happening to us," she told AFP.

"Those orbiters are like people to us. They have personality and we think of them as members of our family."

Like many long-time inhabitants of Titusville, Gaedcke is personally linked to the shuttle program: her father, brother and sister have all worked at Kennedy Space Center. She even worked there herself for a while.

"Every family here has a story similar to or exactly like that," she said.

But the town of 45,000 people is bracing for the loss of 40 percent of the 8,000 jobs -- many held by highly paid and well-educated residents -- that directly depend on Kennedy Space Center and vanish with the shuttle.

At one popular restaurant where current and former Kennedy Space Center employees like to gather, the atmosphere was morose when patrons were asked about the end of the shuttle.

"It\'s very sad to see that," said Betty Ford, a retiree who worked as a document manager at Kennedy Space Center.

She said she has watched nearly every launch, dating back before the shuttle flight in 1981 to first human spaceflights by the Gemini, Mercury and Apollo missions in the 1960s.

"Pretty much all of my life I saw the space program," she said.

As to what she planned to do for the final launch, she said only: "It\'s kind of a private thing."

At the King\'s Duck Inn, a bar where technicians and engineers -- some of whom were recently laid off -- like to grab drinks after their shifts, some expressed anger.

"We don\'t know what the future will be like," said Garry Broughton, a former engineer with the contracting company United Space Alliance. He recently lost his job after a 32-year career there due to layoffs and has entered retirement.

"All we know is is that more people are losing their jobs on a daily basis," he said, clutching a beer in his hand.

Broughton said he disagreed with President Barack Obama\'s decision to cancel the Constellation program, which aimed to return humans to the moon, in favor of focusing on new projects that could take humans to Mars or an asteroid.

"It was not a good decision, it killed thousands of jobs," he said. "We don\'t know were we are going... all we know is we will pay the Russians to put our people in space."

Once the shuttle program ends, the world\'s astronauts can hitch a ride on a Russian Soyuz capsule at a cost of $51 million per ticket.

"The next five years will be very tough," said Melissa Stains, president of the Chamber of Commerce of Cocoa Beach, a beach town a short drive from Kennedy Space Center.

With the next US human spaceflight a minimum of four years away, she said it will be a struggle for even private companies like Boeing, SpaceX and others to fill the economic void that the shuttle\'s closure will leave behind.

"Just recently, NASA laid off 450 and SpaceX hired five. So it\'s not the same and we need to encourage other business to come," she said, pointing to hopes that alternative energy companies might come to make use of the abundant wind and sun.

According to the director of the Space Coast Office of Tourism, Rob Varley, the shuttle program averaged several launches per year, and each brought in $5-6 million, meaning a $25-30 million loss per year.

Tourism is focusing on the area\'s other attractions, such as offering cruises from nearby Port Canaveral to Disney World in Orlando, some 45 miles (70 kilometers) away.

One sure draw will be the shuttle Atlantis, which will make its retirement home at a section of the Kennedy Space Center open to visitors.

But with no more active launches, Varley hopes tourists will want to come watch private companies test their rockets -- such launches happen 15-20 times per year, he said.

"Our challenge is going to be how do we keep people engaged in the space program that will continue here," he said.

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