Crash Course: Florida's Economy Sinks as Space Shuttles Make Final Flights

COCOA BEACH, Fla., Nov. 1, 2010 — -- Traffic on route A1A is sluggish today, just like the economy here on Florida's Atlantic coast, south of Cape Canaveral. The state's unemployment rate is reported to be 12 percent, but people around here say they cannot believe it is that low.

People are hurting here, just as they are around the country, but in the seaside towns around the Kennedy Space Center, they have extra reason. NASA is winding down the space shuttle program, which has employed thousands of people around here for 30 years -- and the Obama administration has canceled the program that would have come after it.

"I feel sorry for those guys," said Bill Thompson, a painting contractor from Orlando who brought his son to a local air show. "Businesses are closing their doors. Just look at all the vacancies. They talk about the trickle-down effect? Well, it trickles down to me."

In the heady days of John Glenn and Neil Armstrong, this part of Florida began to call itself the Space Coast, but today, except for the Space Coast Credit Union ("Great Checking. No Drama."), there are few signs that astronauts used to hang out in Cocoa Beach.

Sure, you can turn right on I Dream of Jeannie Lane, but the Saturn apartments look quaint compared to the Ocean Landings Resort and the Twin Towers.

Florida has moved on.

"I've had to lay people off," said Thompson. "I've got to take care of myself first."

Gene Gibbar scratches his head when he talks about the end of the shuttle program. He says he came here to retire.

"I don't know what all those people are going to do," he says. "I guess they'll have to go somewhere else."

"Have you seen very much effect yet?" a reporter asks.

"Well, not really." He pauses. "Except for the housing market -- we're trying to sell our house. It's been on the market since June." He pauses again. "We've had three lookers."

This part of Florida has been through tough times before. The thousands of space workers -- and people in related fields -- lost their jobs in the 1970s after the end of the moon landings. It happened again in the 1990s when NASA's budget shrank during the Clinton administration.

Then came that awful morning in 2003 when the space shuttle Columbia was supposed to land at the Kennedy Space Center but never made it. Having apparently been damaged on liftoff two weeks earlier, it broke up as it re-entered the atmosphere.