Friday Night at the Space Center

"Goodnight Jon," the boys sleeping in the Bridge Sick Bay just sang out in a somewhat mocking tone. Jon is making his rounds reviewing the Space Center's safety procedures.
"Goodnight Jon!"
"Goodnight Zac!"
Two more rounds of the goodnight chorus rang out from the Bridge Sick Bay - surprisingly in unison.

Tonight we are hosting students from Barratt Elementary located in American Fork. Thirty nine are settling down for a long winter's night. Joining them are over twenty of our valiant and stalwart staff, sleeping in the Magellan, Odyssey and on the stage.

One boy just called to go home. The thought of staying here overnight was more than he wanted to handle, having just survived several hours in a simulator defending universal liberty and justice. He will return in the morning refreshed and ready to take on the forces of galactic evil.

The loft sleeping compartment is creaking. The wooden platform holding the mattresses creaks every time on of the boys changes position. It's just loud enough to wake me up in the middle of the night.

The rooftop heating unit just switched off. It does that at midnight every Friday night. It switches back on at 12:10 A.M. It is eerily quiet without that monstrous fan blowing continuously. It becomes the background noise you grow accustom too - never stopping to notice unless it switches off.

One of the Barratt boys stood in the school's hallway just before I assigned the boys their sleeping areas an hour ago. He held up both hands to cover his eyes.


"I'm a weeping angel," he said to a friend sitting in the lobby.

"You're a Doctor Who fan," I chimed in. He nodded. Speaking would take him out of character. He crept forward every time his friend took his eyes off him. Then he lashed out for the kill. His friend jumped up and took off down the hall. Jon and I watched, marveling that this ten year old had the patience to sit through an entire episode of Dr. Who.

I just remembered I forgot to ask the boys if they walk in their sleep. I put sleep walkers on the bottom bed of our three level bunk beds. Oh well, I'll find out soon enough when I'm woken in the middle of the night by the crash and scream of one of them falling from a top bunk to the hard floor beneath or find them shuffling through the office, moving things on my desk or rummaging through the bookshelf.

The worst case of sleepwalking at the Space Center occurred several years ago. One winter's night I heard the Voyager's outside door open. The cold rushed into the office. I jumped up and ran to the emergency exit. Outside stood one of the boys, standing in the snow in his underwear - no socks or shoes and looking quite bewildered. I knew it wasn't an escape attempt by the look on his face. I turned him around and escorted him back into the school and back up to the sleeping quarters. He recognized his sleeping bag and jumped right in - asleep instantly. He remembered nothing of it in the morning.

It's nearly 12:30 A.M. I'm falling asleep at the computer. Time to go to bed.

"Goodnight," we all say in unison.

Mr. W.

50 Years Ago - Tiros 4 Launched to orbit

Tiros Weather Satellite.

FIfty years ago NASA launched the 4th member of the Tiros weather satellites. The launch occurred on February 8th from Cape Canaveral with a Thor-Able rocket blasting off from Launch Complex 17A. I have another source which claims the rocket used was a Thor-Delta configuration. Thor-Deltas were generally launched from LC-17. The Thor-Delta was the forerunner to today's Delta-class rockets.

Thor-Able rocket.

Thor-Delta rocket.

Both rocket configurations are similar. In either case, the Tiros-4 weather satellite was placed into orbit and began sending photos and data back to Earth within 24 hours. The satellite was about 42 inches in diameter, and cylinder-shaped. Two different telephoto cameras were installed, with other sensors and communications systems. The Tiros weather system enabled forecasters to more carefully watch cloud cover, storm systems, and photograph weather events from orbit.

By Mark Daymont
Spacerubble.blogspot.com

50 Years Ago - American Atlas problems delay launch

Friendship 7 on Atlas rocket.

Fifty years ago, it was the USA experiencing all sorts of rocket problems. NASA was behind the Russians on launching men into orbit of the Earth, and was eager to send up astronaut John Glenn in the Mercury Capsule, nicknamed "Friendship 7," on top the Atlas rocket. The Atlas had more thrust and fuel than the Redstone, used to launch Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom into sub-orbital flights over the Atlantic.

The launch would have taken place on January 27, but weather played a part in cancelling that flight. Astronaut Glenn had patiently waited for more than five hours strapped in the capsule until word came down that the bad weather would prevent flight controllers from monitoring his liftoff during the first critical few minutes.

Then on January 30, worse news was given to the press and the waiting American public: a fuel leak in the Atlas booster would need repairs. As John Glenn put it: "Sure, I'm disappointed, but this is a complicated business. I don't think we should fly until all elements of the mission are ready. When we have completed all our tests satisfactorily then we'll go." On February 1st, NASA announced that repairs would be completed by February 13, and the flight could be launched then.

John Glenn practices entering Friendship 7, with the help of Gunther Wendt, the famous German rocket scientist-turned-American-rocket-engineer-now-pad leader who led the team of engineers working on the launch pad.

Also on February 1st, the American public began showing their frustration with the delays. Politics were involved in space back in 1962, just like today. Congressman James G. Fulton, who was the top Republican on the House Committee on Science and Astronautic, said "There's no doubt our overall space program is slipping despite the high words and fine praise coming from the White House... if it continues to slip we'll be lucky to get a man on the Moon before 1980."

Remaining positive, on February 3rd Glenn announced to the press that the scheduled rocket flight on February 13th "can only bode success." He was still unaware, of course, of further delays to come.

Meanwhile, on February 4th, the world was quite relieved to see a prediction fail to come to pass. It just so happened that Hindu astrologers had predicted that because of an unusual alignment of five planets and the Sun occurred. According to their prediction, a previously unknown and invisible planetoid named Khentu would also move into alignment and cause Earthly disasters. Of course, nothing happened, and the Indian Prime Minister chided the astrologers and their public believers for such nonsense.

Posted by Mark Daymont
Spacerubble.blogspot.com