Saturday, July 08, 2006

Co-op's Log...Flight Day 4

Just thought I'd give you all an unofficial status update of things up in orbit. The Station and Shuttle are doing just fine. Docking went smoothly, we added another crewman to the ISS(first 3-man crew since 2003), unbirthed the MPLM(Multi-Purpose Logistics Module) and attached it to Node-2, and things are set for the first EVA tomorrow. All looks good.

The highlight of tonight's Orbit 3 shift(my shift) was the passing of the ISS directly overhead Houston around 9:45pm CST. Almost the entire ISS and Shuttle flight control teams left Building 30 and congregated outside to watch the passover. It was pretty cool; nothing I hadn't seen before, but it's still cool. The station/shuttle were amazingly bright and very easy to spot. The station/shuttle stack passed right over MCC, and it one frame you could see both the streaking star(the shuttle and station) and the illuminated American flag protuding prominently atop MCC. I wish I had a camera, as it was a VERY good shot.

And one more thing...I now have a new favorite astronaut(not that I had one to begin with). And as it turns out, she's actually one of the ones that went up on Discovery a few days ago: Stephanie Wilson. Why do I like her? See below:

Notice the cap she is wearing while taking a ride in the Space Shuttle motion simulator.

And another shot of her in the Lab mockup in Building 9, just to reinforce the point(she's from Massachusetts, by the way).

Well it's late here. Too late. Around 3:30. I'm worn out and headed to bed.

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