rrrrrriiiiiicccccchhhhhhAAAAAArrrrrrdddddd GGGGGG RRRRRRuuuuuussssssssssssoooooo "Space Camp Memories: Youth Programs' -- Reflections of Life" is a journal depicting real-life events. Names, places, and events are real and have not been fabricated. "Space Camp Memories: Adult Adventures -- Reflections of Life" is Copyright © 1995 - 2012 by Richard Giovanni Russo (Author) and kept by Vortex/RGR Productions, Inc. (Publisher), a subsidiary of Communicore Enterprises. All Rights Reserved, including the right to reproduce this body of work or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. Any unauthorized reproduction of this material without the expressed written or otherwise permission from the author and Vortex/RGR Productions, Inc., is strictly prohibited and will be challenged to the full extent of the law. The events pertaining in this collection is the intellectual property of the author and is hereby Copyrighted. Unauthorized use of author recanted events and situations within this work are prohibited by registered marks. Failure in complying may result in penalty under law. Editions: 1.0: June 11, 2012 Version: 1.0 2 table OF contents PROLOGUE: ”Space is the Place” ............................................................. 04 U.S. SPACE CAMP | Session 31 | June 11-16, 1989 . - Day Zero: ORIENTATION DAY o Sunday | June 11, 1989 ................................ 07 o Vladimir Report: “Shuttle Launch Sequence”............. 17 - Day One: ASTRONAUT TRAINING DAY o Monday | June 12, 1989 ................................ 20 o Vladimir Report: “Marshall Spaceflight Center”......... 35 - Day Two: MICROGRAVITY DAY o Tuesday | June 13, 1989 ............................... 39 o Vladimir Report: “Space Shuttle Tile System”........... 52 - Day Three: SHUTTLE MISSION DAY o Wednesday | June 14, 1989 ............................. 56 o Vladimir Report: “The Pathfinder”...................... 67 - Day Four: ROCKETRY DAY o Thursday | June 15, 1989 .............................. 69 o Vladimir Report: “Missile Row”......................... 81 - Day Five: GRADUATION DAY o Sunday | June 16, 1989 ................................ 83 MIDLOGUE: “A Desire to Return?” ............................................................. 89 U.S. SPACE ACADEMY | Session 24 | June 16-21, 1991. - Day Zero: ORIENTATION DAY o Sunday | June 16, 1991 ................................ 92 - Day One: SHUTTLE OPERATIONS DAY o Monday | June 17, 1991 ................................ 104 - Day Two: MISSION EXPERIMENTS DAY o Tuesday | June 18, 1991 ............................... 114 - Day Three: TEAMWORK BUILDING DAY o Wednesday | June 19, 1991 ............................. 127 - Day Four: SHUTTLE MISSION DAY o Thursday | June 20, 1991 .............................. 137 - Day Five: GRAUDATION DAY o Sunday | June 21, 1991 ................................ 150 EPILOGUE: “The End?” ............................................................. 157 3 ProLogue Imagine having a dream so different that it is hailed as “the first of its kind in the world.” In 1950, when Dr. Werner von Braun arrived in Huntsville, the tiny Alabama town that called itself the “Watercress Capital of the World,” it boasted a population of just 15,000 souls. Over fifty years later, it is forged forever in history as the place where America’s space program began, where the rockets were developed that put the first U.S. satellite into orbit, sent men to the moon, and power the Space Shuttle, all thanks to the ambitions of Dr. von Braun and his team. It was during his tenure as Director of Marshall Space Flight Center when Dr. von Braun approached the Alabama Legislature with the idea of creating a museum jointly with the US Army Missile Command and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. After the state’s lawmakers and citizens voted in 1968 to finance construction, the US Army donated land on its Redstone Arsenal. Two years later, the U.S. Space & Rocket Center was dedicated: “By the citizens of Alabama to those Americans who have made it possible for man to walk on the moon and to explore the universe, and to the youth of America who will use the technology of space for the benefit of mankind.” But Huntsville is known for more than just being a Rocket City. Von Braun also believed that young people had a lot to offer. He cultivated the idea to expose young people to science and math, using the space program as the focal point of such a course of study. If the country had baseball and football camps, why couldn’t science have a camp to encourage interest in the space program? In the mid 1970s, he began to work on the Space Camp idea with then US Space & Rocket Center Director Ed O'Buckbee, who saw the idea through to fruition. In 1982, U.S. Space Camp opened its doors to its first cadet group and hasn’t looked back since. * * * Space Camp Memories as a book is a product of my experiences at the US Space & Rocket Center’s youth programs: Space Camp (for 4 th , 5 th and 6 th graders) and Space Academy Level I (for 7 th , 8 th and 9 th graders). In the past, an attempt to write a memoirs about my Space Camp experiences was discussed, but the project never seemed to progress beyond a few scribbled notes in a steno pad and a loose plan. But I knew that I would eventually have to organize those notes into some kind of final form or lose those memories forever. The journey from there to here began in the summer of 1991, after completing my Space Academy experience. On a blistering hot summer day, I decided to make a recording – the “Dream Tape” – to not only stand as testimony to some of the dreams I had before my first Space Camp experiences, but to define some of the events that had just transpired. 4 The recording was short – about 30 minutes or less – but invaluable in noting some of the more pressing events that took place at Space Academy, Level I. Three years later, in 1994, during the week of June 11 through June 21, of what you will come to know as the “Space Camp/Academy Awareness Weeks”, I would again put my voice to a recording for a tape called “Space Camp Memories”. This turned out to be a rather bold step in this process as it would provide, for the very first time, the means for me to discuss whatever I remembered about both programs, to dig deeper and provide a more in-depth analysis of some of my most treasured memories of Space Camp and then have it saved for posterity. Little did I know how instrumental both tapes would become in the creation of the Space Camp Memories book. But that isn’t what you’re going to read; not exactly. Let me explain. Even with all the past work I had done, the dream of a “complete” “Memories” book was still not solid. Through writing things out on paper, minute details I thought I had long forgotten began to surface and that helped. I was astonished that these details were kept, locked in the various passages of my brain, but there too time had reared its ugly head. It was a relentless enemy and though I tried to keep the stories that unfolded from that exercise in the order of their actual occurrence, much of what unfolded there was woefully inadequate. But by the end of the summer of 1995 I was ready and the first version of Space Camp Memories was released. Over the years since, up through 2002, a number of updates have come to the text bringing with them more clarity in both pictorial form and memory recollection. But that still wasn’t enough. What I had written was disconnected from the experience, told well after the fact in distant third person form. What I really wanted was to be able to re-live the experience – from the jittery first day of orientation to the accomplishment and sadness of graduation – placing me, and the reader, in the midst of the action; however, much like during the gestation of the first edition, the redux project never seemed to progress beyond a few outlines and a number of well intended notes. By then, though, I had returned to Space Camp as an adult – twice – and thought of writing about those experiences instead. But if I did, what would become of the original experiences? And how would I tie the two together? In the 10 years between the last version and this I’ve had time to hone a flurry of outlines, to write scores of pages of notes, and mull over what I should and shouldn’t do with the material at hand. Sadly, no matter what I did (or do), some of the memories I have of Space Camp and Space Academy are lost completely. So what I have done here is completely re-imagine the experiences as a series of entries in a journal, presented (with a smidgen of artistic license) as if they had been written at the moment the experiences were occurring. I have in effect placed myself (and you as the reader) in the midst of the action so as to get a piece of it. An act I had originally intended all along. So I hope you enjoy this new look into my Space Camp experiences, as much as I did crafting, remembering and re-writing… 5 U.S. Space Camp Session 31 June 11 – 16, 1989 6 SSSSSSPPPPPPAAAAAACCCCCCEEEEEE CCCCCCAAAAAAMMMMMMPPPPPP MMMMMMEEEEEEMMMMMMOOOOOORRRRRRIIIIIIEEEEEESSSSSS 1989 // Space Camp, Session 31 Day Zero – ORIENTATION DAY Sunday | June 1111,, 11989 Hi there. We’re at the end of our day now and we’ve been given about an hour or so to prepare for lights-out, our bedtime. During this time we should shower if we’re going to shower (there will be time in the morning but availability might not be there), to brush our teeth and do whatever else we need to do in order to get ready to sleep. We’re heading off a bit early because they’re going to wake us up early in the morning too! Followed by calisthenics, bed making inspections and who knows what else before we even get the opportunity to eat breakfast.