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UPDATE # 58 - November 6, 1998 PART 1: It's all about kids IT'S ALL ABOUT KIDS
This week I was delightfully surprised by three reminders that kids are what this project is all about! Through the mail I received a hand-drawn Halloween card to John Glenn from 7-year-old Chelsea. You can see it at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/kids/work.html I also received a journal through the e-mail from a second grader, sharing the launch experience. The journal is also reproduced below for your enjoyment. These both give me the opportunity to remind you teachers that we love to publish student work! Please consider sharing the products of your students' interest in Space and STO online. Instructions on how to submit them may be found at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/events/posting.html The third thing I received was a new Student Stumper. If you're not familiar with these, let me encourage you to take a look at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/kids/stumpers.html The idea of Student Stumpers is to provide a place for kids to communicate with other kids. Students create a question that they think will be difficult but fun to answer. We post the question on the web, and other students respond directly to the student that created the question. It's fun, it's easy and could be an excellent classroom activity. I would like to again encourage some feedback from you as we continue to plan the Space Team Online activities. We used to regularly publish the status of processing for the Columbia Shuttle from the KSC website. I have omitted that section from recent Updates. Do you miss it? If you'd like me to resume posting these, please let me know at the address below. Linda Conrad UPCOMING CHATS
Note: Space Team Online QuestChats require pre-registration. Please sign up at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/chats ->Thursday, November 12, 1998, 10 AM Pacific Time (1 PM Eastern): Ric Adams, project engineer at Kennedy Space Center, is involved in inspecting the space shuttle for any minor damage before, during, and after a mission. See his profile at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/adams.html ->Thursday, November 19, 1998, 10 AM Pacific Time (1 PM Eastern): Rick Pettegrew works with a team that analyzes the characteristics and behavior of fire. Rick and his team try to better understand the science by performing experiments in reduced gravity environments. Read Rick's profile at: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/pettegrew.html AFTER-SCHOOL CHATS PLANNED As part of our continuing series of after-school chats, we would like to invite you to join our next chats coming up this month. Our first after school chat will be with Jack Farmer, an exobiologist and member of Mars Team Online/Space Scientists Online projects. This chat is scheduled for Thursday, November 12, at 3:00 p.m. Pacific Standard Time (6:00 p.m. Eastern Standard time). More information about this chat is available at http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/mars/events/interact.html Our next after school chat will be with Nancy Dorighi, a computer engineer and member of the Women of NASA project. Our chat with Nancy is scheduled for Wednesday, November 18, at 3:00 p.m. Pacific Time (6:00 p.m. Eastern Standard time). More information about this chat is available at http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/women/won-chat.html. We hope you will be able to join us for our upcoming after school chats with Jack Farmer and Nancy Dorighi. You can learn about upcoming chats with other NASA experts on our schedule of events page, at http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/common/events. We hope to hear from you online! [Editor's note: Second grade teacher Pat Farley accompanied students from Churchville Elementary School, Pennsylvania to attend the launch of STS-95. Below is one of the journals.] First grader, A.J. Tus writes:
October 28 When I woke up, I went to the Kennedy Space Center. I learned that the KSC is a wildlife reserve. I saw alligators, three bald eagles, and a bald eagle nest. I saw the processing building. This is where the space shuttles get processed for the next mission. They do not paint the rocket orange because the paint weighs 650 pounds. We did not go to the launch pad because of the fuel. John Glenn will take termites into space. I hope he survives in space. I went to three movies. The best was "The Dream Is Alive". October 29 When I woke up, I went to the space shuttle launch. I like John Glenn very, very much. I hope that he does not die in space. The reason I like John Glenn is that he is the oldest astronaut and the first person to orbit the earth. And he is brave. The space shuttle contains many dangerous fuels. I hope this historical moment will last. I talked to our principal (Mr. Reid) and looked out at the shuttle on launch pad #39B with Mrs. Farley's binoculars that I borrowed. We were five miles away, but it didn't matter. We saw Air Force One, and everyone got up. The launch looked like a shooting star but instead of coming from the sky to the earth, it looked like it was coming from the earth to the moon. Everybody cheered. I dressed up as an astronaut for Halloween. [Editor's note: Mike has had several changes in his life since last he wrote. Be sure to see the picture of baby, Jessica, in the online version at http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/journals/hembree/11-05-98.html ] WEARING THE EXTRAVEHICULAR MOBILITY UNIT http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/space/team/hembree.html November 5, 1998 Hi! It's been quite awhile since my last journal. I now have a new daughter, Jessica, who was born in January. Our recreational time is different now, as everything revolves around Jessica. We love it! She is so much fun and is such a blessing. As far as work goes, earlier this year I was able to get in the tank, at the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, wearing the EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit), better known as the spacesuit the astronauts wear in space. As a trainer, it is beneficial, for me and the people I train, if I have some real knowledge and experience of what it is like to actually be in the suit. This gives me a better feel for what the crew goes through and the difficulties involved. It was a very enlightening experience to be underwater and weightless. I did what was called a "Suit Qual", or suit qualification dive. This involves performing certain normal tasks underwater in the suit. I was in the water for about three hours - moving up and down the payload bay, opening storage bins, retrieving tools, getting into foot restraints, and just getting a general feel for the suit and weightlessness. I really enjoyed this experience, and, personally, I didn't find it much different from scuba diving, except the field of vision is different. Scuba diving has a small mask with limited vision, and the EMU helmet gives you much more area to see out of, including use of peripheral vision. The group I work with is broken into two different training areas: training the crew on the tasks they must do in the suit and training the crew on the suit itself. My area is the training of how the suit itself works. This includes how to put the suit on, how it works, where all equipment is stowed in the suit, how to prep the suit, how to apply stericide (used between EVAs to disinfect the suit to control bacteria growth caused from sweating, etc.) to the inside of the suit, malfunctions and failures with the suit, a run-through of timeline procedures, ensuring the crew has plenty of logistics (batteries, cartridges, and other consumables needed by the suit), following all the new designs of the suit and keeping crew updated, and just following the flight requirements in general. I am in charge of training for STS-92, which is Flight 3A for the station. During this flight, four crewmembers will perform four EVAs back-to-back. Due to the back-to-back scheduled EVAs, the complexity of this flight is similar to that of the Hubble Space Telescope EVA missions. STS-92 is just one example of the increased complexity of all missions that perform Space Station assembly. In fact, we will do more EVAs in the next four years than in all of the U.S. space program history. This is what we refer to as the EVA Wall. In September, I became the EMU Lead for the suit trainers. This, of course, adds a lot of responsibility to my job. This includes being a member of the EMU Board, that meets and discusses everything concerning the EMU. This allows me much greater exposure to the bigger picture, which makes me more knowledgeable overall. It also puts me in charge of assignments, which I must make and track the progress on. Recently I was certified as a MPSR in the back room of the MCC (Mission Control Center). I hope to cross-train and get certified to work the front room of the MCC. For this to happen, I must obtain the additional certification of task instructor (currently, I am certified as a suit instructor). MPSR (pronounced "mipser") stands for Multi-Purpose Support Room. MCC has a front room worked by FCRs (pronounced "fickers"), which means Flight Control Room, and a back room worked by MPSRs. Both groups work together to monitor the missions.
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