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Election 2008

Mitt and Ann Hold Hands at Pad 39A

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
March 7, 2008

NASA FOIA Images: Mitt Romney Tours SSPF-Pad 39A at KSC on 21 January 2008

NASA caption: “Images taken of the Mitt Romney tour at KSC are not, in any way, intended to reflect the endorsement of any candidate by NASA. These images were taken during a tour that is typically provided to other VIP’s. NASA has not authorized the use of these images for campaign purposes and has obtained a commitment from the Romney campaign NOT to use these images for campaign purposes. These images are being released in response to FOIA requests.”

Editor’s note: Click to enlarge image. Isn’t it a little odd that most people who are seen in this location are required to wear bunny suits and caps – and yet politicians and their spouses are not? [see comments below as KSC folks correct my assumptions regarding bunny suits – but not about the special access granted to Romney]. Let’s see how NASA answers my FOIA request as to what constitutes a “VIP” and what the process is for evaluating and approving (or denying) requests for these personal tours and photo ops – conducted at taxpayer expense.

Kerry Blows Opportunity at KSC, 2004 post

Comments? Send them to [email protected]. Your comments thus far:



You don’t need a bunny suit to get into the White Room, just to get into the orbiter itself. Mitt and Ann are OK as long as they don’t “break the plane” of the hatch.

At least, those were the rules when I toured the place during STS-123 TCDT. We needed bunny suits to get inside Discovery in OPF-3, but not to get into the White Room, as long as we did not actually go inside Endeavour.


About your photo of Mr. Romney, you are INCORRECT about the requirement of wearing clean room garments at that location. The yellow hose you see on the left side of the photo is providing a positive purge inside the crew module that exits out the only opening (I/E Hatch). Only requirement for clean room garments is if you were going to gain access inside the crew module. So please do not think he was given special privileges.

Editor’s note: With regard to “special privileges”. Can I get a tour like this? Can anyone get one just by saying that they want one? Anyone can run for President.


I am not taking any political stands here at all, I merely wish to set the record strait. In the picture shown, the Romneys are doing nothing wrong (from a work area perspective at any rate). The white room at the pad is NOT a clean room environment. Engineers, technicians and astronauts routinely sit, stand and work in “street clothes” right exactly where the Romneys are. I have done so myself on numerous occasions. It is where we don the cleanroom garments to enter the orbiter.

One walks across a tacky mat entering the whiteroom (which has a positive purge on it coming from the yellow duct entering the orbiter in the picture) and there tyically is one behind where the Romneys are sitting to control contamination.

IF they actually entered the orbiter, cleanroom garments would be required. That has always been the SOP.

The overalls one sees technicians wearing when the crew enters the orbiter for flight are flame retardant garments, not clean room garments.

Sign me:

A long time Shuttle veteran from KSC


They’re not that unusual. When I visited, the people working inside the orbiter were in “bunny suits”, but so long as you stayed outside, it wasn’t a requirement. This was a few years ago, but I don’t think the rules have changed much. This wasn’t a formal NASA tour, so no PAO cameras or minders, but we were informed what the rules were.

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.