Astronaut Dom Gorie, a Palmetto Senior High School graduate, is pictured wearing a Panthers ball cap during his recent space shuttle flight.

The 11-day flight featured a large radar antenna which mapped 80 percent of the Earth's surface.

Before launch astronauts combine relaxation and training by flying T-38 training jets. Most of the astronauts prefer acrobatics but Dom and astronaut Janice Voss decided to take a scenic tour down the Florida coast the day before their launch.

"Janice and I flew over South Florida and we flew right over where I grew up," Gorie said. "I pointed out South Florida, the airports, places where we'd go fishing and diving. And just a couple of days later we were looking at it from space."

Gorie's launch featured an interesting situation. The NASA Test Director, Doug Lyons, is a graduate of rival Killian High School. Could Gorie, a Panther, trust his arch rival, a Cougar?

Lyons and Gorie put aside their inter-school rivalry, but they did take the opportunity to give each other a couple of good-natured jabs. Before launch, voice checks are made between each of the astronauts and the launch control center. Here's how the dialog sounded between NTD Lyons and pilot (PLT) Gorie:

Gorie: "NTD, (this is) PLT. Good Morning from the Panthers to the Cougars.
Lyons: "PLT, this is NTD. I've got you loud and clear and I copy 'Go Cougars.'
Gorie: "Good morning, Doug."
Lyons: "Good morning, Dom."

In an interview after the flight, Gorie said, "I just enjoy teasing Doug Lyons all the time about Killian. He's a real nice guy. I enjoyed meeting him."

Gorie graduated from Palmetto in 1975 while Lyons graduated from Killian in 1982. So they never had the opportunity to compete with each other.

"But, big school rivalries transcend when you went there," Gorie said.

"In high school I was a varsity wrestler for a couple of years. Killian was always the big rival back then, this was before some of the larger schools were even built. Killian and Palmetto had a big rivalry, I remember the people I wrestled against. The matches were always very close.

"When I was a junior and senior, we won one [match] and lost one. When I was there Palmetto had a stronger team in the dual meets and state tournaments. We just had a great rivalry and looked forward to those matches with a lot of intensity. I guess that stays with you for life."

The radar mapping required one of the lowest altitude shuttle flights, about 60 percent of the altitude of Gorie's previous space flight. Flying closer to the Earth surface Gorie was able to see much more detail.

"I took a whole bunch of pictures of Miami looking straight down. So I got some really good pictures this time. From 125 miles you can easily pick out all of the airports, the major roads. You can see the reefs, quite a lot of detail. It was easy to pick out specific areas of town. It was really easy to see from that altitude.

"There's a park near Coral Reef Drive and 77th Avenue with some ball fields. I wouldn't be surprised if you could pick that out with a clear good focused picture. There's a mall that's a couple of miles north of the high school that I'm certain we can see."

Coastal areas like Miami and Florida show up well in views from space.

"One of our slides was looking from the south. You could see the edge of the Bahamas and up to Jacksonville. You could clearly see Miami and Key Biscayne and Lake Okeechobee," Gorie said.

With over 100 astronauts and only a handful of shuttle flights each year, astronauts spend most of their time in management and technical support roles helping prepare other crews for their missions.

But he's anxious to get a third space flight.

"I'm certainly looking forward to getting another one. It's certainly addictive, especially when you come back from a flight and realize how fun and rewarding that is."

In addition to visiting his high school, Gorie is scheduled to talk to the Southern Cross Astronomical Society, an organization for amateur astronomers.