Houston update

[gfish]

I finally got to sleep! A lot! While we have stuff to get done, this is going to be a nice quiet weekend. Monday we have the final hardware review, where some very serious NASA guys look at our stuff and tell us what needs to be changed overnight. Then we fly on Tuesday and Wednesday and... the project is done. Really done.



Hanger 990 at Ellington Field, where the Weightless Wonder and the 2 remaining WB-57 high altitude bombers live. This is where we're supposed to be doing all our work on the robot, but we're rebels and figure doing it in the air conditioned hotel room makes more sense.


The robot sitting in the hotel room. It arrived without any damage, yay. This picture is very out of date -- that area is now something of a disaster area. We're about halfway through attaching the foam padding, which is kind of messy.


adularia getting fitted for an oxygen mask for the hypobaric chamber ride. My hypoxia symptoms were pretty much the same -- mental confusion, lack of attention span, and tingling fingers.


The hypobaric chamber is at the NBL, the Neutral Buoyancy Labratory, where astronauts practice EVAs. It's the largest swimming pool in the world. In the tank yesterday was a Shuttle cargo bay and some ISS hardware mockups.

Comments

[tfabris.livejournal.com]

Great pictures. I'm so happy for you. I didn't realize that big swimming pool was there in Houston. Vix told me about the little cones you had to add to the robot to prevent embolisms. (!)

Me: "Oh. 'Weightless Wonder' is so much better than 'Vomit Comet'."
Vix: "No, it's not. It's utterly stupid."

[vixyish.livejournal.com]

Tony also wanted to know today if the plane is still a KC-135, and if it is the same KC-135 or if it got replaced. (I remembered that the flight got postponed due to maintenance on the plane, but I couldn't remember if it was merely worked on or actually replaced.)

Mewmewmew!

[gfish.livejournal.com]

No, it is now a C-9. They replaced it last year, and the new plane had some problems with the cargo door sealing properly, which is what bumped our flight. (Those have been fixed now, fyi.) They were going to get another KC-135, but budget cuts forced them to downgrade a bit. But they tell us the C-9 gives a much smoother ride with better freefall, so hey.

Mewmewmew. :)