Going to Space to Study Earth (Armchair Astronaut, Jul. 2011, Part 1)

Welcome to this ninth edition of Armchair Astronaut! To commemorate the space shuttle's final mission (scheduled to occur this month), I decided to feature a book on the space shuttle this month. It's called Sky Walking, by astronaut Tom Jones. He flew four shuttle missions in the 1990s and early 2000s, even completing three spacewalks, which expanded the International Space Station!

Remember how I told you a couple months ago how the book Carrying the Fire by Mike Collins really shared how it felt to be an astronaut in the 1960s?? Well, Sky Walking by Tom Jones is really a good "sequel" to Carrying the Fire, as Jones shares what it really felt like to be a shuttle astronaut.

Tom Jones put in his astronaut application many times before he was finally accepted into that elite group in 1990. But even before being selected, he had many Houston-related adventures. In the fall of 1989, NASA invited Jones to Houston for a week-long astronaut interview. While on the interview, Jones experienced both high and low points. He loved meeting moonwalker John Young, and chatting with real astronauts about what the job really entailed. He drooled over the astronauts' personal T-38 commuter jets, and enjoyed writing an essay on that childhood question of, "Why do I want to be an astronaut?". However, Jones liked less the personal interview with NASA brass and the doctors' tests, especially with the comically-named Dr. Hind! At least, Jones figured, if I don't make the cut, I'm getting a first-rate health exam courtesy of the government!

The Hairballs

"Ascan" Tom Jones during training

To his delight, Jones found out a few months later that he had indeed made the cut. Soon he, his wife Liz, and his kids Annie and Bryce moved to Houston. But if Jones thought he had any reason to feel stuck-up and important, he had a few lessons to learn. For instance, when he showed up for his first day of work, he learned that he wasn't really an astronaut yet. He was an Ascan, or astronaut candidate. He and his fellow ascans would undergo a year or so of training before being declared ready for flight assignments. Ugh.

One of the funnier things about the 1990 astronaut class was what they decided to name themselves. Each astronaut group had come up with a name for themselves, such as the "New Nine" or "The Thirty-Five New Guys". Jones and the other 1990 ascans comprised Astronaut Class XIII, or thirteen. They took the number thirteen, good and bad luck, and black cats all in consideration, and wound up with the name of "Hairballs". I thought that was quite funny!

During his ascan year, Tom Jones learned many things. He refreshed ejection-seat use in Oklahoma, and land-survival training in Washington State. If Jones wasn't off on some trip somewhere, he was back at Houston either in the classroom or the simulators learning all he could about the shuttle's intricate and complex systems.

As the Hairballs neared the end of their year or two of being ascans, they all wondered when a Hairball would be assigned to a flight. More importantly, it was who. Once some Hairballs got a flight assignment, everyone knew that it wouldn't be long till the rest of the Hairballs were in orbit.

Finally, a real astronaut

In February of 1992, Tom Jones received a mysterious summons to his boss Don Puddys' office. When Jones arrived, Puddy was there to meet him, along with fellow astronaut Linda Godwin. In a few short, exhilarating moments, Tom Jones was assigned to his first space shuttle mission. Launch day was just over eighteen months away!

L-R, the STS-59 crew:
Godwin, Chilton, Jones, Apt, Gutierrez, and Clifford

Just over a year later after his shuttle flight assignment, Jones finally learned who else he'd be flying with. Sid Gutierrez would command Jones' flight, also known as STS-59. Kevin Chilton, more commonly known as "Chili", would be the pilot. Jay Apt and Michael Clifford would join Jones and Godwin as the mission specialists on the flight.

What would be the mission of STS-59? There was certainly no ISS to build at this point. Instead, STS-59 would be a space mission to study Earth. (Yes, I know it seems strange, to go to space to see Earth. But remember, learning about Earth ended up being one of the great accomplishments of Apollo. And Apollo's "official" goal was to study the moon!) NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) near Los Angeles had built a Space Radar Lab to gather data about the Earth, and STS-59 (also known as SRL-1) would take JPL's equipment to orbit and learn about Planet Earth.

Time sped by as Jones and his crewmates trained, trained, and trained for STS-59. Sometimes it was fun. Sometimes it was hard. Always, it was exhausting. Launch day slipped to April 1994. Finally, on April 9, 1994, the STS-59 crew was strapped into their gleaming white spaceship, Endeavour. Jones' duties were simple compared to what the commander and pilot were doing, but still Jones was nervous. What was it going to be like to ride this spaceship? Soon he would find out. Just 6.6 seconds before launch, ten stories below the astronauts, the main engines roared to life. A million pounds of thrust rumbled, barely restrained and impatient to take Endeavour to space.

Wham! Launch occurred, and Endeavour was no longer held to the Earth. The Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs), the External Tank (ET), and the orbiter (space shuttle) all spewed out fire, propelling Endeavour--and Tom Jones--to orbit. The vibration and noise was so much, Jones could hardly press the "start" button on his stopwatch. Nearby, the SRBs greedily consumed five tons of propellant a second, burning at an almost inconceivable 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Jones, and the rest of the STS-59 crew, rode safely along...just feet from scorching death.

Forty-five seconds after launch, Endeavour was already going Mach 1, or as fast as sound travels. Seventy-nine seconds into the flight, Endeavour was speeding along at Mach 2. Eighty seconds, and Endeavour, the ET, and SRBs weighed just half of what they did at launch. When her eight-and-a-half minute ascent into space was complete, Endeavour would be traveling at Mach 25.

Orbit. As soon as Endeavour reached space and orbit (at a measly 17,500 mph!). Soon the entire crew was busy preparing Endeavour for life in orbit, and enjoying the views out the window when they weren't operating JPL's Space Radar Lab. With over 10,000 photos to take, STS-59 was one shutter-happy crew as they flew over geological hot spot after geological hot spot. The scientists were ecstatic. Tom Jones was having the time of his life!

Too soon, it was time to come home and let the scientists get their hands on all the data and photos that the astronauts had collected. On April 20, 1994, the STS-59 crew prepared to come home. Jones was fascinated as he watched Endeavour glide through the ever-changing plasma, giving a light show the likes he had never seen before. Outside, the temperature soared to 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The Pacific Ocean gave way to southern California, and soon after that Commander Sid Gutierrez landed Endeavour on runway 22 at Edwards Air Force Base. STS-59 was complete.

L-R, the STS-68 crew:
Jones, Baker, Wisoff, Wilcutt, Smith, Bursch

Though STS-59 was complete, Jones' spaceflight career wasn't over. Just over five months after he returned from STS-59, Jones found himself once more in space aboard STS-68. This time, his crew members were Commander Mike Baker, Pilot Terrence Wilcutt, and Mission Specialists Jeff Wisoff, Steven Smith, and Daniel Bursch. Of course, Jones himself was a mission specialist on the flight as well.

By pure coninsidence, STS-68 launched on the same day that the Kamchatkan volcano  Kliuchevskoi erupted. Scientists were thrilled with the pictures that the crew captured! STS-68 was a sequel, if you will, to STS-59. STS-68 also carried the Space Radar Lab, and flew almost identical orbits, to see what the difference would be. Once again, Tom Jones landed at Edwards Air Force Base, and his two "Missions to Planet Earth" were finished.

To be continued...