Awesome Panoramas

Check out these awesome photos and spherical view things from our mission:


http://nasatech.net/

Deploy pics and President Speech

So now that Hubble has been deployed, we're just chilling in the control room watching our hardware cycle temperature. It was really cool today because while i was on console, President Obama got on the air to ground voice loop and said some words to the Atlantis crew. And the best part was Obama thanked the ground crew of the mission which means me, so Obama has PERSONALLY thanked me for my contribution to Hubble. Sweet!

Here are a bunch more pics of the Hubble deploy:

Bye!

SM4 Is DONE!

All EVAs are complete and HST has been deployed! It was a total success. The shuttle and crew is still up in space and we're still in Houston, but only for a couple more days.

Here's a few more shots of the last EVA day. I'll put up some of the deploy later.







WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Hubble EVAs are Complete!!!

Today we just finished our last EVA! woooooo hooooooooo!!

We just have to deploy Hubble tomorrow and then we're doooooooooooone. They took a huge team picture today in one of the main control rooms. I'm in the middle way in the back.

Pics of me on console!

Some people have been going around taking pics of everyone, here's a couple with me in them:

Our top-notch team

Me, doing something really important like saving the astronauts...most likely

There also is a documentary team running around filming everything. I'm in a couple of the clips (in the background mostly). Here's the link for what they have so far, and they'll be posting more each day.

http://hubblesite.org/servicing_mission_4/

Mission Control Center

Right now i'm on console at Johnson Space Center in Houston (as in "Houston, we have a problem"). And speaking of Apollo, I'm in the same building as the original Apollo control room! Back then, each person only had 1 monitor and they communicated between rooms using pneumatic tubes (like at the bank). Here's a picture of one console in the Apollo era control room:



Another very famous NASA quote is by Gene Kranz, Flight Director of the Apollo 13 mission was said here: "Failure is not an Option". Here's where he sat:




And here's the red phone....ooooooooh red.




Nowadays we have email, a jillion voice loops, live video feed from the shuttle and like 10 monitors to look at. here's what my station looks like
On the TVs is images of our first EVA day. All the rest are our displays and data plots. FUN!

Hi-res Hubble photos

here's some real nice photos of our grapple and berth yesterday:

Hubble Grappled!

Atlantis grabbed the hubble and now were getting ready for mate!

Hubble Again!

here's a brighter picture:

Hubble!

I can see Hubble on the shuttle video feed!

STS-125 Launch Day!

Finally, launch day for Hubble! Breda, her mom Jean and I got on our bus at 10am to head to the causeway on KSC. We set up with a great view of the shuttle and sitting among my HST coworkers.




They had a sound system set up to broadcast the official KSC commentary. They also had a countdown clock set up near our spot.





Tons of buses brought us to the causeway. Wish we coulda stayed on board with the AC blasting.

...3...2...1

Success!

And immediately after launch i had to rush home, shower and drive to the airport to catch my flight to houston:

More updates to come!

Hubble Pics

Here's a link that shows a lot nice photos of our mission:

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/09/preparing_to_rescue_hubble.html

Whoa we're launching in less than a week!

So our launch date has officially been moved up to May 11th at 2pm and we're all ready to go! Last week we finished up a bunch of tests and had a visit by the astronauts. here's a picture of them with two of our carrier managers (managers are the two standing up).






When astronauts show up there's always a TON of picture taking going on (in fact, i sometimes think the only reason they come IS to take pictures). here's one of them in front of a video camera...you can't see the three other professional cameras....and me.





And to prove I actually do work, here's one of me connecting up a cable for one of our final tests. I'm wearing that really cool clean room suit and a harness so i don't fall and hurt myself (but really so i don't hurt the hardware).











Today we took a tour of the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) facility. We learned all kinds of cool things like one SSME creates around 350,000 pounds of thrust which is about as much as one Saturn V engine. I also got to stand in it!

I'll put up some pictures of the famous Apollo Mission Control Center in Houston. Starting on 5/11 i'll be in Houston working 12 hour shifts for 12 days straight until the mission is complete....woo!