Which launch is this , Brett?
https://spaceflightnow.com/tag/aehf-5/ The possibilities are that it goes off on time, in which case I will be occupied for about 10 days before it would be conceivable to leave, it slips (a few days at a time) which puts it right in the middle of the NATs. It could of course slip a few days at a time until after, but I can't count on that. It might blow up on July the 12th, a which point I would have to be about halfway across Nebraska to make a normal schedule.
This was a barely-workable plan when the launch was going off on the 27th, hard to see if it went off on the 28th, but NET July 12? No chance. Sad thing is, the airplane was going to be ready in adequate time to get some test flights, it could have been in clear on July 2nd, fly the weekend of the 7th, rub out 8/9/10, jump in the car at 5 AM on the 11th. Same schedule as 2006, more-or-less.
The problem (as the link above notes) is a battery on the upper stage (Centaur). In other cases, they may have risked it, but ours is an "extended" mission that holds on to the spacecraft until it gets all the way to geosynchronous, then uses up all its remaining fuel to boost the perigee. This is different from their standard mission, which only goes for about 45 minutes. Since it runs strictly on batteries, they won't take any chances for fear of having the batteries deplete before it gets there, which would be catastrophic to the mission.
Brett
p.s. This is it, getting put in the shipping container. My office is about 150 feet away, right down the middle of the picture.