PART 1: T minus 5 minutes
PART 2: A week of action
PART 3: The search for a balanced life
PART 4: A trip East

As I write this, the Probe entered the Jovian atmosphere about 55
minutes ago. In about 5 minutes, hopefully we'll get the first
confirmation that things are working. Everybody here is about 
to pop with excitement. 

I hope that I'll see some of you online on WebChat

November 27, 1995
As I write this journal, there are 10 days to go to Jupiter arrival. 
The big day is a week from this Thursday. I can feel the intensity and 
emotion of the Galileo Flight Team building. It is now 6 years since 
launch and 18 years since I started working on Galileo.

What follows are highlights (as best as I can remember) of the two 
weeks since my last journal entry:

Monday, November 13
In the middle of all the work happening on the Navigation Team, I had 
to interview a job applicant today. We have an opening in the 
Trajectory Analysis Group for this coming January. It's hard to 
concentrate fully on a job interview at this time. My mind is 
elsewhere.

Tuesday, November 14
I interviewed another job applicant today. This is probably the last 
one (at least until after Jupiter arrival). There was also a Section 
Staff Meeting in the afternoon that lasted over two hours. (A Section 
is one of the basic organizational units at JPL. I am in the Navigation 
and Flight Mechanics Section.)

Thursday, November 16
This morning there was a meeting at which the strategy for OTM-1 
(Orbit Trim Maneuver #1) was discussed with Project Management. 
OTM-1 is the first correction maneuver after the Jupiter Orbit 
Insertion (JOI) burn. The entire development of OTM-1, starting with 
the Navigation Team's design of the maneuver and ending with 
sending the maneuver commands to the spacecraft, is done in only 
about 24 hours starting a few hours after JOI is completed, so it's 
important that we are ready to go. OTM-1 is scheduled to run soon 
after JOI because the longer we wait, the more propellant we will 
have to spend for the maneuver. This particular maneuver will allow 
us to compensate in case the gravity assist from the Io flyby is too 
high or too low, or if Galileo's main engine "overburns" or 
"underburns" during JOI.

At this meeting, Dennis Byrnes (a trajectory analyst on the 
Navigation Team) talked about a new strategy for OTM-1 that would 
allow us to move the date of the first satellite encounter in the 
orbital tour (Ganymede 1). The advantage of this that the size of the 
correction that's needed at OTM-1 becomes smaller. This saves 
propellant which is generally in short supply. However, changing the 
date of the Ganymede 1 flyby might mean that some or all of the 
science observations at Ganymede 1 would be lost. This might be the 
preferred strategy, however, if OTM-1 required such a large velocity 
change to get to Ganymede 1 at the currently scheduled date that 
there would not be enough propellant to finish the orbital tour. In 
other words, it might be better to lose the first satellite encounter 
in the orbital tour instead of the last three or four satellite 
encounters. This is a major decision, and choosing one way or the 
other was postponed to a later date.

Friday, November 17
Today is the approval meeting for the final versions of the 
spacecraft sequences that run from a few days before Jupiter arrival 
through the end of December. Events in this time period include the 
JOI Tweak (discussed in two of my earlier journal entries), the Io 
flyby, Probe Relay, JOI, OTM-1, solar conjunction, and OTM-2. Solar 
conjunction is the several-week time period when the Sun lies nearly 
between the Earth and Galileo, and we cannot reliably send commands 
to Galileo because of interference from the Sun. It was a long 
meeting, lasting several hours. Today is 20 days before Jupiter 
arrival, the day that we would have performed TCM-27, which was 
canceled. (I discussed the story of TCM-27 in my last journal entry). 
So in some ways, today's workload is a little lighter than I might 
have predicted it would be.

Saturday, November 18
You might ask: what am I doing at work on Saturday? TCM-28, the 
next scheduled maneuver, would be performed (if approved by the 
Project) on November 27 (or 10 days before the Io flyby). The 
schedule for TCM-28 calls for the Navigation Team to finish 
designing the velocity change for the maneuver 9 days before the 
maneuver is performed. Nine days before November 27 is November 
18, which happens to be a Saturday. Orbital mechanics doesn't 
recognize weekends. We completed the maneuver design by about 4:00 
PM.

The situation for TCM-28 is very similar to that for TCM-27. If we 
don't do TCM- 28, the spacecraft is predicted to pass by Io at an 
altitude of 1080 kilometers, or 80 kilometers above the desired 
1000 kilometer altitude. This is a significant difference. However, 
the predicted flyby altitude could be in error by several hundred 
kilometers, because the tracking data has not been as accurate as we 
had expected. Nevertheless, because there is only one more scheduled 
maneuver after TCM-28, the Navigation Team will recommend that 
we do perform TCM-28.

Sunday, November 19
The Project decided to go ahead with the next stage of the maneuver 
development for TCM-28 (this is the work done by the Orbit 
Engineering Team -- figuring out how to achieve the desired velocity 
change with the spacecraft's thrusters). However, the actual decision 
about whether to perform TCM-28 won't be made until next Tuesday 
at the Maneuver Design Approval Meeting.

Tuesday, November 21
The TCM-28 Maneuver Design Approval Meeting was taken up entirely 
with a discussion of whether or not to continue development of TCM-
28 and perform the maneuver. The arguments for performing the 
maneuver were: (1) the spacecraft trajectory would be moved closer 
to the "aimpoint", (2) it would protect against us getting into a 
situation where we needed to change the spacecraft's trajectory but, 
for whatever reason, the one remaining TCM (TCM-28A at 5 days 
before Io) could not be performed, and (3) it would give us early 
warning if there were a problem with the propulsion system that 
might affect TCM-28A. 

On the other hand: (1) the uncertainty in the Io flyby altitude (several 
hundred kilometers) is much larger than the correction that would be 
made (80 kilometers), so it's not clear that performing the maneuver 
actually helps, (2) performing TCM-28 does not reduce the likelihood 
of having to do TCM-28A, and (3) members of the Flight Team would 
have to come in to work during the Thanksgiving weekend (meaning a 
greater workload for the Project, and increased stress for the flight 
team). 

In the end, the Project decided not to proceed with TCM-28 and to 
focus instead on ensuring a successful TCM-28A. This is part of 
working on a complex mission like Galileo: in order for the mission to 
succeed, we have to explore many possible paths thoroughly, even if 
we don't journey down them. (By the way, the day that I am writing 
this journal entry is the day that we would have performed TCM-28. 
Oh well.)

In addition to the events described above, I had to deal with a number 
of questions coming from the mission planners. Since these questions 
dealt with events happening a long time after Jupiter arrival, I found 
them to be distracting. I find that my mind wants to focus only on the 
Jupiter arrival events now.

As I write this, the major Jupiter arrival activities remaining for 
the Navigation Team are:
     Generating daily orbit determination solutions for the trajectory.
     The design and execution of TCM-28A (Friday and Saturday, Dec 1 - 2).
     The JOI Tweak (Monday and Tuesday, December 4 - 5).
     Monitoring the radio tracking (Doppler) data during the Io flyby
       and JOI on December 7.
     The design and execution of OTM-1 (Friday and Saturday, Dec 8 - 9).

So there is still a large amount of work ahead of us

December 2, 1995
Today is Saturday, one of my days off, and I wanted to tell you about 
the group of singers that the Galileo Project has. They are called the 
"Not Ready for Real-Time Players", and as a nickname I call the group 
the "Players". A group of Project staff (scientists, secretaries, 
integrators, etc.) started to join together in the far and distant past 
as satirical entertainment for the Christmas and Launch Anniversary 
parties. It became so popular that the group was asked by the project 
management to entertain more often. Launch anniversaries, 
Christmas, and any occasion that had merit. I joined the Project a 
month or so before one of their launch anniversary parties. At the 
party I was still meeting people I didn't know - when all of a sudden, 
the audience started to laugh. Jan Ludwinski (one of my team chiefs) 
was introducing the Players. They then proceeded to put on a show 
medley of tunes. They were having a lot of fun, and all of the tunes 
were recognizable, but all of the words had been changed! It was 
satire at its best.

Lyrics had been changed to reflect the angst of reengineering, and 
management woes. Everyone in the audience (all project members) 
were laughing. I decided to see if I could join this select group. I 
couldn't write satire or lyrics - but I could sing!

Well - they are a friendly group of people. They invited me to sing 
with them whenever there was a show. The Players only come 
together and practice a few weeks before their show - they don't 
practice every week. So our next show was for Probe release in July. 
I was nervous! I hadn't sung in years, and I was on stage in front of 
hundreds of people! But we had fun. The audience is usually project 
related, so the lyrics reflect that. For example for Probe release we 
sang a tune called "Turkey in the Straw" and the words were changed 
to "Probe in the Bay" and so on. The other song that we sang was 
"Please Release Me" with some of the words changed. It was very 
appropriate because we were releasing the Probe from the orbiter. 
The audience loved it. There were a few teachers in the audience, and 
they later requested the material so that they could have their 
students sing it and learn about Jupiter and Galileo.

Dr. Carol Polanskey is the leader of the group, and she talks with 
project management about potential shows that we can participate 
in. Right now we are practicing for Arrival Day on December 7th and 
we are having great fun. We have so many different songs, we had to 
vote for the top five because we don't have enough time to do all of 
them in our allotted time slot. We have been getting together on our 
lunch breaks and after work to practice. I also practice at home 
- which is what I have to do right now, so I'll talk to you later.

The next day - December 3, 1995
Today is Sunday and I am trying to catch up on my rest. This next 
week is so exciting and I know that it will be stressful. Yesterday I 
went and got my hair cut, and a new outfit to wear for the special 
event. When I am at home I like to kick back and do nothing, but it 
doesn't work out that way. There is always food to shop for, laundry 
to clean, and other things that make your house a home. My three cats 
want extra attention when I am home as well. I won't even mention 
the time that goes into making a marriage work. My husband isn't 
happy with me right now. He wants me home cooking dinners instead 
of working overtime.

So when it is finally the weekend, he is already upset with me so it 
ruins the rest of the quality time that we might have had. Oh well - 
my marriage will hopefully last forever, but Galileo Arrival Day will 
be over December 7th! By the way - I need to remind myself to stay 
up late tonight so that I can watch the Discovery channel at 9pm. 
They are having a special called "On Jupiter" and several of my 
friends on the Galileo Project will be featured. If you get a chance 
you should watch it too, because it will be interesting. It should be 
repeated later in the week if you missed it this time.

December 4, 1995
I have officially recovered from my trip to Boston and points north! I 
spent the Thanksgiving holiday with my father, sister, and countless 
other relatives including my sons Matthew and Adrian (he's in school 
there). It was great fun. Since I don't often get the opportunity to 
celebrate the year-end holidays with the Randall and Sheridan crew, 
we decided to make Christmas arrive a month early--on Friday after 
Turkey day to be precise. A great time was had by all.

Of course, no trip to the East Coast is complete without a visit on 
Vinal Haven Island off the Maine coast. So.... off we raced to catch the 
boat (it runs 5 times a day, the last one leaves the dock at 3:15). We 
arrived at the dock at 3:20!!!! I did it AGAIN. MISSED the boat. Now all 
was not lost. There is a plane but the pilot was in New Hampshire! No 
plane available.... Well, that left the boat at 5 p.m. but it goes to 
North Haven!!! Okay... a quick call to the island, arrangements made, 
we'd take the North Haven boat and get a "taxi" across the 
Thoroughfare to Vinal Haven. We arrived on North Haven at 6:15 p.m. 
after sunset and caught a ride across in an open aluminum skiff (very 
small boat - no cabin) in total darkness. Boy, do I have a new 
appreciation for the night sky!!! Try moonlight sailing on Atlantic 
ocean in November!!! It was an exhilarating experience but well worth 
the effort.

On Monday, I spent the day at the island school with some of the 
science classes. We had a great time discussing UFO's, Online from 
Jupiter, and making comets. The rest of the time was spent with 
family. Alas, time is so precious and passes too quickly there. Sooner 
than I wanted, it was time to get on the boat bound for Rockland and 
make our way back to Boston. Leaving the island is always an 
emotional thing, a little part of me stays there. Until this trip, I 
thought I was the only one who experienced this but Matthew was a 
bit teary-eye as well. The time had come to return to Los Angeles but 
not before I saw snow fall. Wednesday morning (our departure day) 
marked the first New England snowfall of the season.

While I was showing the island students the Online from Jupiter 
page, I realize that orbit insertion was within days. After 6 years, 
we were DAYS away.  And now I just can't believe this is the week!!! 
Galileo is less than 96 hours fro Jupiter orbit insertion at this 
writing. Although more than 6 years have gone by since we launched 
the spacecraft, time seems to have passed like a blink of an eye. Both 
the spacecraft and the project have had many problems to overcome 
but here we are.... just hours away! The anticipation and excitement 
have already started to build around here. It will definitely hit a high 
crescendo on Thursday afternoon... Everyone will be running on 
adrenaline alone by then... myself included!

I woke at 4 am this morning; the insomnia begins already. (This 
always happens to me at emotional/stressful times!) There I am, 
lying in bed, mentally reviewing the day ahead... all the "stuff" on my 
calendar. It's going to be busy....

Let's see - Monday - here's my day. Another meeting to discuss 
observing plans for the ninth orbit. Preparing for and attending this 
meeting will take most of the day.  We call this an integration 
meeting but sometimes it could affectionately be described as a pack 
of wild dogs fighting over one small bone We have science 
instruments and objectives that conflict with each other due to 
spacecraft resources, geometry, and time. Combine this with the fact 
that each science representative wants to get the best possible data 
for their instrument team and you can easily see that these meetings 
could be a bit stressful. At the end of 3 weeks of meetings, the 
result will be a good overall science plan for Orbit 9 and compromise 
for all parties involved. It's like sharing your favorite toy with your 
brother; first your parents make you and then as you get older--MUCH 
older--you do it willingly. Sharing and compromising are lessons w 
learn again and again and again.

At 4 p.m., the fun part of the day begins. There is a rehearsal of the 
Not Ready for Real Time Players; I'm a member. Who are they?! Well... 
about 6 years ago, at a Galileo Christmas Party, a group of 
individuals got together to provide entertainment for the project 
personnel. They took well-known songs, wrote new lyrics, and 
performed them. The group was so well received that now NO Galileo 
Christmas, Launch Anniversary party or any other Galileo event is 
ever without a performance by the Players. Project management 
requests our presence to entertain the Galileo troops and Orbit 
Insertion day is no exception. We will give 3 separate performances 
this Thursday so the week will be filled with rehearsals to get us 
ready for the big event.

As for Thursday.... How will I feel? I'll be excited, nervous, happy, 
anxious.... all those emotions mixed up together; feels something like 
the firs day of school or the first day of a new job... What will I be 
doing? The day will start like any other but end like none before it. 
I'll be spending the part of the day in my office trying to work and 
performing with the Not Ready For Real Time Players. It's going to be 
a great day in the life of an exciting mission and I'm really thrilled 
to be a part of it.