We made our way to Houston, TX this morning to take a VIP backstage tour of NASA and Johnson Space Center. We had no idea that this would be such a spectacular, all day event! Our first stop was lunch, which they provided for us in the cafeteria for the astronauts and employees. We could choose whatever we wanted, and as much as we wanted. When we finished, we all got water bottles to take with us in the van – it was another scorcher! We saw the Robotics labs where they are working on a robot that will go up in just a few weeks that has apposing fingers that are as capable as human hands to do fine repairs in space! So far, only the upper torso, arms and head will be mounted on a rover. They have not been able as yet to fine tune the legs to be able to support the weight of the Robot, and still allow it to be very nimble and accurate. They have committed to sending “Robonaut” up, complete with legs in three years!
We also saw a full scale Space station that is submerged in a HUGE pool. This is where the astronauts train to repair anything on board, as well as learn to do it in a near weightless state. We were able to go into several full scale, retired training shuttles, capsules, and space stations. The units from Russia, Japan and Canada are also represented as training in case we need to deal with anything that goes wrong with these units. We saw the flight trainers that the pilots use to learn how to deal with all possibilities of circumstance while in space.
At the Johnson Space Center, we saw the control room for the most recent Space Shuttle Missions and the control room for the International Space Station. The first room is the one that received the blow by blow sequence of the tragic events leading to the ill-fated flights of the Columbia and Challenger shuttles. The second room is presently dealing with an ammonia leak that could force the American Astronauts to evacuate their living quarters. Both rooms were operational, and we could see people dealing with real-time issues! We even saw a man at the Capcon desk that was just accepted as an astronaut candidate! We were able to actually go out on the floor of the old Mission Control room! This is where the first manned flights and the first space walks were monitored. This is also where the tragedy of Apollo 11 was dealt with. It is also where mission control feverishly worked to return the crew of Apollo 13 to Earth. When funding for the Apollo program was cut, they already had three rockets built that were never used, and we saw one of them. It is in a hanger big enough to hold all five of it’s stages!!! We walked through a display of how they researched the lunar material that was brought back to Earth, as well as a beautiful 3-D timeline of the Space Program all around the room.
We drove all around the facility and saw where they research the food that goes on board the flights, where payloads are “Rattle tested” to survive the shaking of launch, where the astronauts work out, the trailers that belong to all the news groups to use when stories unfold, the NASA funded Texas Longhorn Project, the hangers for the rovers, the isolation building for the Astronauts before they fly, and so much more!!!! We also saw parts of the landscape that were representative of the Lunar and Martian surfaces. Astronauts use these for training as to their specific missions, and to train on the use and maneuvering of the Rovers. We actually saw the newest Rover that will carry Robonaut into space being driven back to the hanger that we were fortunate enough to be standing right in front of!
We were taken through so many of the halls where all the research is happening! It was a really thrilling experience! I am so glad that we went. Our tour started at 11:30 and we didn’t leave the center until after 6pm! That got us back on the road pretty late, so we grabbed dinner at Cracker Barrel and drove into Louisiana. Again, we arrived after 2am L
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