Serendipitous Launch Epitomizes the Spirit of Space Coast

It wasn’t like he had a backup plan in place, but then again, of course he did.

For FLORIDA TODAY senior photographer Malcolm Denemark, the scrub of the Polaris Dawn launch led him to Cocoa Beach and this oh-so-Space-Coast shot of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket rising from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

He’d planned to shoot the Polaris launch from Port Canaveral. With so many launches, Denemark said, it’s “getting harder and harder” to find new locations from which to shoot the launches, especially those with local landmarks.

But when Polaris Dawn was scrubbed around 10 p.m. Tuesday, about five hours before its planned liftoff, and SpaceX announced an early morning Starlink mission, he decided to try Minutemen Causeway on the beach.

The result: serendipity, and a photo that looks as if that were the scene Denemark had planned to shoot all along.

“The red lights from the Beach Shack and ambient light giving the palm trees a glow … it turned out to be the perfect location,” he said.

“The waning crescent moon lighting up the ocean was an added bonus for a night launch photo.”

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Serendipitous launch shot is so Space Coast | Photo of the Week, Aug. 25-Aug. 31, 2024

Source: Florida Today