So picking up where I left off, after leaving the VLA I headed down to Las Cruces for work. Actually, I stayed in Las Cruces but my job was in the White Sands Missile Range, just over the mountain pass 20 miles or so. Inside the base, about 100 miles north of where I entered it, is the Trinity site where the first nuclear bomb was tested. It's open twice a year for the public to tour, unfortunately one of those times did not coincide with my visit. There is a museum on base though.
An open air display of many of the missiles they've tested there over the years. What about the Bomb you ask? Here's one. You might recognize it from it's stint on that long con of a TV show, LOST. It's called the Fat Man.
Sobering. I mean, it could have actually had a plot, and then it would have been a great show, but they made their cowardly writing choices, and all we were left with was that fat bloated sorry excuse of a bombed TV show. Bomb... right, sorry, got sidetracked. At any rate, as fascinating as a "museum"consisting of a yard full of devices designed solely to exterminate as much of the human race in one shot as possible is, I did run across something a little more interesting.
I don't know if you'll be able to read that so here it is, cropped.
I would guess that they were trying to insert this into the Roswell narrative somehow, but the "first firing date" of 1966-1967 is well after the alleged UFO Crash near there so it's a clumsy attempt in that case, especially since it also seems to have abandoned the "weather balloon" story but then why bother mentioning Roswell at all? I sort of suspect that it's a bit of a psi-op, or perhaps the military folk at White Sands actually simply have a sense of humor. We'll never know, because I'm sure a sense of humor in the military is classified information.
So out in the middle of the base, just off of the public highway that runs through it, is the White Sands National Monument. It's a vast sea of sand dunes composed of white gypsum crystals, where the military base took it's name from.
Got a picture. The sand really is very white, and because it's gypsum it stays cool to the touch even at midday in a very hot sun. I walked around barefoot for a while, it was nice.
But you know, sand is sand. I drove on to Alamogordo where they have the International Space Hall of Fame, which is not sand, and which is dedicated to the less destructive aspect of rocket technology. It's always fascinated me how the two aspects of rocket science so perfectly represent the potential destruction or salvation of the human species. The ones designed for killing are meant to fly only high enough to get over their target before crashing back down in fiery armageddon, while the ones designed for exploration are meant to keep going up and up until they escape the insanity of local politics. The other more interesting thing about this inherent symbolism of rocket science is that we humans are ourselves the architects of the instruments of our own destiny, whichever way it goes. If there is ever a day of Heavenly Judgment, raining fire on us from above, it will be of our own design.
Having said that, they all crash in the experimental phase. This is a crashed V-2 rocket, designed by Werner Von Braun for the Nazis before he came over to our side. They also had a moon rock at the museum, showing that sometimes rockets do get to where they're supposed to be going.
I got to hold it thanks to an amateurish bit of trick photography. I also hit on one of the pretty scientists that worked there. She was all wrapped up in her work though. "Hey baby, can I have a job?"
One of the other museum guides who worked there was a guy named Viggy who had worked on the Hawk missiles from their inception over at Fort Bliss in Texas. He was obviously proud of that so I asked him to pose with his rocket for me.
The only other interesting thing going on at the Space Hall of fame was that Ham, the first chimp in space, is buried there. I paid my respects.
After leaving the Alamogordo area, I headed back to White Sands for work, and from there I made my way back up to the VLA for some more shots before flying home. But I'll leave it here for now.
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