The HabForum

What are your favorite memories from missions?

I remember on my first mission in my first year (SC), I was commander for discovery. Of course, none of us knew this until just before landing, I had not control over the orbiter. On final approach, I was coming in at a much lower angle then anyone expected, this is basically what happened:

Spript: *Commander: (pulls back on stick)*
Everyone in mission control: PULL UP! PULL UP! PULL UP!
Me: *yanks stick* I AM PULLING UP! THE ANGLE OF ATTACK IS TOO LOW!
Kid from Russia: What the h*ll?
Everyone: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Then on the second mission that year (the one with random positions) the commander had no clue what he was doing, and reentered and landed with the cargo bay doors open, and survived. We were talking to Bob Springer about it later, he visited camp that week. I was Mission Scientist that mission, probably the most boring position. They had me switch to CAPCOM for 5 minutes, I can't remember why.

My SA mission was relatively uneventful, I barely remember it. I was shaken up from homesickness, a bad team, and being PROP. But I do remember the commander not knowing a thing, and landing 10 miles away from the runway.

I thought that I would actually have to control the shuttle, so in the weeks leading up to my first trip, I kept doing reentry and landing practice in orbiter, lol. I also remember getting a crowd watching me do a perfect landing in the landing sim at USSRC.

I was Commander of Discovery for a Space Academy Level I mission. Our mission went rather smoothly with only minor anomalies...until I decided to hotdog during the descent phase and deviate from the flight plan! I told the pilot it would be HER job to arm and deploy the landing gear during final approach, so that I could concentrate on lining us up with the runway just right. I had practiced landing the shuttle so many times in my sim at home, that I completely forgot about the little deal we made when we made the final approach in Discovery. I went through all the motions and put the landing gear down without even thinking about it...until I looked over and saw my pilot hitting some switches which turned out to be the landing gear switches on her side of the cockpit! By then, it was too late, Discovery was skidding down KSC Runway 33 on her bare belly! We survived, but our spacecraft would require extensive repairs!

For Space Academy Level II (now ASA), I would be Commander of Atlantis. The launch went smoothly, with the exception of one of the crew members getting sick. Upon reaching orbit, my Pilot went crazy and had to be duct taped and put in the airlock. The mission continued and the Mission Specialists went out on their EVA's. Ahh, finally, the part of the mission where a Shuttle Commander can sit back and relax. Or so I thought! A fire broke out in the cockpit and I was the only person inside the orbiter other than my Pilot, who was incapacitated. I donned the last space suit from the mid-deck and gave the Pilot specific instructions to stay inside the airlock and to keep everyone out on EVA from entering the orbiter while I depressurized the cockpit and put out the fire. I saved my crew and made a perfect landing!

Well, I was communications and tracking officer (CATO) on our first mission. Our entire team was obsessed with The Hunger Games, by the way. So INCO and I got into a little disagreement over whether or not the station specialists should be allowed to make duck noises into the microphones. Admitably, I glared at him and started yelling. Flight director looked over at me, laughed, and said, "geez, wrong Cato. There isn't any need to get violent."

When we were all laughing, one of the counselers set off a double anomaly... But it was still AWESOME!!!!!