Verification Flight Test One

Four days past Thanksgiving, on 28 November 1983, six men in bright blue flight suits strode from KSC’s Operations and Checkout Building into a bewildering blaze of media flashbulbs. Leading the sextet was John Young, chief of NASA’s astronaut corps, veteran Moonwalker and the first human to leave Earth a sixth time. His pilot was Brewster Shaw, an excited rookie’s grin cleaving his face from ear to ear.