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NASA Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center Group Tour Planning Guide & Toolkit

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NASA Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center Group Tour Planning Guide & Toolkit National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center Group Tour Planning Guide & Toolkit www.nasa.gov Image Credit: NASA WFF Table of Contents A Message from Visitor Center Staff Stay Connected……….………………………………………………..1 Preparing for Your Tour Planning Tools……..…………………………………………………3 Reservation Checklist…..…………………………………………….4 Tour Package Options………………………………………..………5 Add-on Experiences Lunch Options ……………………...……………………....………...7 Intern Presentation……....……………………………………………8 Programs at the Visitor Center……………………………………….8 Movies at the Visitor Center………………………………………….9 Visitor Center Exhibit Hall & Gift Shop……………………………..9 Scheduling Processes & Timelines Planning Checklist for Groups with Foreign Nationals……………11 Planning Checklist for Groups with U.S. Citizens and Lawful Permanent Residents……………………………………...…………12 Preliminary Reservation Form……………………………......…13 - 14 How to Prepare (day of tour) Letter to Tour Organizer………………………...……..………16 - 17 Letter to Tour Participants………………...……………..…………18 What if My Group is Not Qualified for a Tour?........................19 - 20 Disclaimers……………………………………………………………21 - 22 Thank You A Message from Visitor Center Staff A behind the scenes tour is a great way to learn first-hand about the diverse programs operated at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility located on Virginia's Eastern Shore. Goddard Space Flight Center’s Wallops Flight Facility, established in 1945, is the agency’s premier location for conducting research using suborbital vehicles - aircraft, scientific balloons, and sounding rockets. The research and responsibilities of Wallops Flight Facility are centered around providing a fast, low-cost, highly-flexible, and safe response to meet the needs of the U.S. aerospace technology interests and science research. Its partnership with the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) expands the facility’s capabilities for supporting the launch of orbital vehicles. During a behind-the-scenes tour of Wallops Flight Facility, visitors gain insight from engineers, scientists, program managers, and pilots about how rockets are fabricated and tested, how the Range Control Center operates, what missions our pilots and aircraft are currently flying, and how the Scientific Balloon Program Office operates. To learn more about behind-the-scenes tours, to ensure your group meets the guide- lines and requirements, and to plan for an enjoyable experience please review this planning guide and toolkit. It was designed for use by tour organizers; providing helpful tips and information to make the scheduling process enjoyable. STAY CONNECTED @nasawff @nasawffvisitorcenter @nasa_wallops www.nasa.gov/centers/wallops www.nasa.gov/centers/wallops/visitorcenter 1 Preparing for Your Tour Image Credit: NASA WFF 2 Planning Tools Where to Begin Read the Group Tour Guidelines & Scheduling Information document to ensure that your group meets the requirements for tours before proceeding with the scheduling process. GROUP TOUR GUIDELINES & SCHEDULING INFORMATION Consider all available options for tour stops and review available lunch options, Visitor Center add-on experiences, movies, and special presentations. View these options on pages 5 - 9. Making Reservations Book your tour early. Tours must be schedule a minimum of 4 weeks in advance, howev-er, it is recommended that you start the scheduling process as soon as possible to increase the likelihood of receiving your first choice. Accessibility Wallops Flight Facility is a place where everyone can participate equally during tours, pro- grams, and events. Let us know in advance if anyone in your group requires special accom- modations or if you have accessibility questions during the scheduling process. Cancellations & Notices Please notify the Events and Outreach Coordinator immediately if your group needs to change or cancel a scheduled tour. Both tentative and confirmed schedules are subject to change or cancellation due to ongoing operations, launch date changes, and upcoming missions/launches. Wallops crash fire rescue vehicle K-9 patrol dog demonstration 3 Reservation Checklist You must be able to answer “YES” to all the questions listed below to begin the scheduling process and to move forward to the Preliminary Reservation Form. Is the tour group a non-profit, school, educational, or civic group? Yes No Is everyone attending the tour at least 4th grade level (9 years old) and up?* *If your students are K – 3rd grade please contact the Events & Outreach Coordinator to find out what field trip options are available for your group. Yes No Does the group have their own transportation (van or bus) that will allow everyone to fit into 1 vehicle with room for one badged escort? Yes No Does the group have a minimum of 8 participants attending the tour? Yes No Does the group have a maximum 20 participants attending the tour?* *If a group has more than 20 participants please contact the Events & Outreach Coordinator to find out what options are available for your group. Yes No Can the group tour Wallops on a Tuesday or Thursday? Yes No Is the date you are interested in at least 4 weeks out?* *For groups with Foreign Nationals it must be 5 weeks out. Yes No If you answered YES to all questions, proceed to the Preliminary Reservation Form. 4 Tour Package Options Half and full day tours are available. Complete Tour Stop Descriptions are available on page 3 of this online document: Group Tour Guidelines & Scheduling Information Suborbital Rockets: Sounding Rocket Fabrication Sounding Rocket Testing Range Control Center Wallops Island Driving Tour Sounding Rocket assembly Orbital Rockets: H-100 Payload Processing Facility Range Control Center Horizontal Integration Facility (HIF) Launch Pad-0A Tour* *Launch pad tours are weather permitting. Antares rocket assembly in the HIF Earth Science: Aircraft Hangar Balloon Program Office NOAA* *Tours of NOAA are 1 hour long and the maximum number of participants is 15. Aerial view of the satellite dishes at NOAA Wallops Overview: Balloon Program Office Aircraft Hangar Range Control Center Wallops Island Driving Tour Image Credits: NASA WFF Scale model of a Super Pressure Balloon 5 Add-on Experiences Maximize your experience by including the Visitor Center, movies and more! Each experience selected will add additional time to your tour. Image Credit: Krystina Carpenter 6 Lunch Options Lunch at the Visitor Center Tour Groups may bring bagged lunches to eat on-site. The Visitor Center has un-covered picnic tables available outdoors for visitor use. Indoor space is not available so please consider seasonality and possibility of inclement weather. Lunch at the Main Base Cafeteria Tour Groups can request to eat at the employee cafeteria on the Main Base. Bagged lunches and cafeteria-style lunches are available for purchase. Please note if the group will be using the em- ployee cafeteria, Visitor Center staff are not responsible for the group’s money and all tour guide- lines apply. Options available in the cafeteria (prices may vary): Daily Entrée Special for $6.25 The daily entrée special includes 2 sides and a large fountain drink. Grill Line Special for $5.25 The grill line special includes French fries. Grill Line Menu (various prices) There are a variety of options available on the grill line menu. This includes pizza, chicken, hot sandwiches, etc. Fruit & Salad Bar for $4.95 lb. Sandwich Bar for $4.95 lb. The sandwich bar is for cold sandwiches only: chicken salad, tuna salad, and a variety of lunch meats are available. Soup of the Day 8 oz. cup is $1.75 or 16 oz.; bowl is $3.25 Boxed Lunch Specials for $5.65* The boxed lunch includes your choice of chicken tenders, cheeseburger, hamburger, or a cold sandwich (chicken salad, tuna salad, cold cut, ham or turkey) along with a bag of chips, cookies and bottled water *The boxed lunch special must be ordered 1 week prior to the tour date 7 Intern Presentation During a 20-minute presentation by the Wallops Education Team, discover what internship opportunities are available to high school, undergraduate, and graduate students that motivate and prepare students for careers aligned with NASA Goddard and NASA Wallops as well as their industry and university partners. You will also learn how to access the One Stop Shop Initiative (OSSI) NASA Intern Portal, complete a NASA profile, and about the experiences and benefits for becoming a NASA Intern. The intern talk is by request only and must be scheduled in advance. Programs at the Visitor Center The NASA Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center offers fun, interactive educational programs FREE to visiting school, educational, and civic groups. These programs range from special presentations to demonstrations and activities. Topics include rocketry, solar system and earth sciences. Programs are approximately 45 minutes long. For a current list of available programs please visit the Field Trip Opportunities webpage. If requesting a Visitor Center program, please include your program choice on the Preliminary Reservation Form. Wallops summer intern poster session Auditorium presentation at the Visitor Center Image Credit: NASA WFF & Krystina Carpenter 8 Movies at the Visitor Center The NASA Wallops Visitor Center offers a variety of movies that can be viewed to complement chosen topics or to enhance your visit. There are two spaces available: a traditional auditorium the- ater and a 3-dimensional sphere theater called Science on the Sphere©. Movie topics include a Wallops overview, a variety of space exploration
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