Oct 30, 2009 Vol 49, No 22

Spaceport News A
John F. Kennedy Space Center America's gateway to the universe
www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/news/snews/spnewstoc.html

,&re A= sors

Tour de KSC kicks off CFC with inspirational ride

By Steven Siceloff
Spaceport News
Spacecraft and bicycles are
more alike than you might
think.
For example, many of today's
top-flight bikes are made from
carbon materials, just like the space
shuttle's heat shield tiles. And just
as with aerospace engineers, bicycle
builders obsess over trimming the
slightest gram from a design. Every
ounce taken off a spacecraft means
extra payload or speed into orbit.
For bike riders, it means saving just
a little extra pain in the leg during a
steep climb or going a bit faster in
a sprint.
On Oct. 17, cyclists even
shared the same real estate as
NASA's shuttle fleet in the name of
charity during the Tour de KSC.
As an employee, I was allowed
to bring three guests. My friend
Mike Sheffield, Team-in-Training
coach Jay Burke and team mentor
Doug Oxendine joined me for the
event.
Yeah, riding a bike is fun and
cool when you're 12 and heading to
a neighbor's house, but most people
grow out of it in the amount of
time it takes for a set of car keys to
drop from a parent's hand into their
palm. But it's still cool to us.
Along with sharing the
common bond of endurance road
riding, all of us are connected by
cancer. Oxendine and I survived
different forms of leukemia, and
Burke's son is a two-time childhood
leukemia survivor. Sheffield also is
a cancer survivor.
We're some of the ones for
whom legs are the best engines and
tight-and-bright clothing is cool.
(We know the spandex is more
comfortable for us to wear than it
is for you look at. That's part of the
fun.)
That morning, there were about
500 of us and organizers say there
could've been a lot more. Some of
us were kids riding by the Vehicle
Assembly Building under the
wings of parents. Some were adults
going by the launch pads on bikes
that hadn't been out of the garage
since John Young and Robert
Crippen strapped into space shuttle
Columbia for the first time.

There were riders from local
teams with established uniforms,
others wearing a couple of T-shirts
to brace from the sudden chill and
a group from Constellation Ground
Operations who made their own
pro-caliber jerseys.
Five dollars of each entry was
donated to the United Way -- $2,500
total. The United Way will divide
that among different charities.
"I'm glad to see
it go to something
like that rather than
just something
internal," Burke
said.
The event was
the brainchild of
Dicksy Hansen
who was inspired
to take up cycling
after she met seven-
time Tour de France Dicksy Hansen o
before the inaugi
champ Lance Hansen pitched t
Armstrong a couple way to raise mon
years ago.
"We were trying
to come up with a fundraiser for
the Combined Federal Campaign,"
Hansen said. "So I just thought of
something I would enjoy ...
something we hadn't done before."
Working since February,
organizers presented their plans to
various center departments and got
the clearances to hold the event.
They drew up several courses and
speed schedules. The only limit was
the number of slots available.
Hansen said she thought maybe
300 people would show up, on the

high side. Instead, the 500 available
tour tickets sold out and organizers
spent the last two weeks turning
people away.
The good news is that the event
went quite smoothly, so the team
already is looking at ways to open it
up to more folks next year.
"I thought it was going to be
pretty overwhelming," said Jane
Mosconi, one of the organizers.
"We had all the
security measures
with unbadged
people and 500
people doing all
different routes.
We wanted it to be
fun, but it had to
be safe."
Our group
NASA/Jack Pfaller was scheduled to
ride a 20 mph pace
anizes riders over the 37-mile
al Tour de KSC
e event as a fun course. Again, we
y for charity found something
in common with
the shuttles --
fighting the wind.
After a ride through the
Industrial Area, the course threw
our band of energetic riders
against the harsh morning winds of
Kennedy's Shuttle Landing Facility.
Our stroll at a fast clip became
a 3-mile grind. It felt like a treadmill
-- our legs were moving, but we
weren't going anywhere.
Our 22-mph pace became 15,
then 13. It was worth it for the
chance to snap a picture at the top of
the runway. Plus, we barely had to

pedal on the southbound leg.
After crossing the tow-way, we
headed for the Vehicle Assembly
Building and the first stop. Cameras
came out almost before our bikes
stopped. Oxendine posed in front
of the building, a landmark his
grandfather helped design as part of
the Army Corps of Engineers.
Back on the bikes and into
the wind again, this time out to a
camera mound between Launch
Pads 39A and 39B. Shuttle Atlantis
was a popular backdrop as it stood
on its mobile launcher platform
prepared for liftoff.
We got back on the bikes and
headed again into what seemed like
a wind determined to meet us in the
face.
We crossed by the Vehicle
Assembly Building and stopped for
more shots before heading back to
the Kennedy Space Center Visitor
Complex.
There was no shortage of smiles
as the riders helped themselves
to pizzas, and no compliment
was spared in congratulating the
organizers.
"The people coming back, they
were saying, 'That was great! That
was great!' which makes us feel
good because we put a lot of work
into it," said Ben Bryant, another
organizer.
A lot of riders are eager to
come back.
"It was great getting out there
and seeing the sites as close as you
can," Burke said. "It's a lot different
than seeing them on TV."

NASA/Jack Pfaller
About 500 cyclists rode past the Vehicle Assembly Building during the Tour de KSC on Oct 17 The event was held in conjunction with the Kennedy Space
Center Combined Federal Campaign, which kicked off a day earlier

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SPACEPORT NEWS

Oct 30 2009

Page 2

Research platform passes ISS test with flying colors

By Steven Siceloff
Spaceport News
When Fabio Tominetti
and Marco Grilli last
saw the EuTEF research
platform in early 2008, it was care-
fully packed inside the payload bay
of space shuttle Atlantis. It had been
built and handled with the utmost
care, and its white and thermal in-
sulation and golden reflective sheets
and experiments were pristine.
EuTEF didn't look much
different as it hung upside down in a
work stand a few days after coming
back to Earth aboard Discovery
after being attached to the orbiting
International Space Station for about
a year and a half.
"It's almost brand new," said
Tominetti, the EuTEF program
manager for the Milan-based Carlo
Gavazzi Space. "It could probably
fly again tomorrow. I expected to
see something to tell you that it
had been exposed to 18 months in
space."
EuTEF is short for European
Technology Exposure Facility, a
remote-controlled base complete
with power and communications
networks built to host nine
experiments from Europe's scientific
community, including prestigious
universities and foundations.
The research largely focused on
the effects of space on materials,
including window materials that
could be used on future spacecraft.
Tominetti and Grilli, a systems
engineer with Carlo Gavazzi,
recently traveled to Kennedy Space
Center to pack the research platform
and its experiments for their return
to Europe.
The EuTEF went into space
with the European Space Agency's
Columbus laboratory module as
part of the STS-122 mission in
February 2008. After Columbus
was connected to the space station,
spacewalking astronauts attached
EuTEF to one of its platforms on the
outside.
From there, the experiments
would be exposed to the harshness
of a constant vacuum, a round-the-
clock dose of radiation, and heat and
cold extremes that vary 200 degrees
during each 90-minute orbit of the
planet.

NASA
Astronauts John "Danny" Olivas, left, and Nicole Stott remove the EuTEF science platform from the outside of the Columbus laboratory on the International
Space Station during the first spacewalk of the STS-128 mission The astronauts moved EuTEF into space shuttle Discovery's cargo bay so the experiments

could be returned to Earth for evaluation

Despite the conditions, EuTEF
returned exciting early results,
Tominetti said. For example, a
study of atomic oxygen around
the space station revealed that two
computer models of the chemical's
distribution were not as accurate as
they should be, but a third model
was correct. Knowing where
corrosive atomic oxygen molecules
are and how they behave in orbit
helps future spacecraft designers.
Although EuTEF delivered
some results while still in space,
researchers will get the chance to
look at the materials samples and
other experiment results firsthand
once EuTEF is taken back to Europe
and shipped to their sponsors.
"There are a lot of small
samples to see the exposure to
atomic oxygen and to radiation, so
they will be quite busy analyzing the
chemical reactions of the samples,"
Tominetti said.
The mission also proved that
the design for the research facility
was sound.
"Starting with nothing in your
hands but some scrap paper and
then building it up was the first big
achievement," Tominetti said.
"What was a little bit scary to
me was the amount of paperwork
you have to do before you have the
real hardware working, to be tested,

designed and flown," Grilli said.
The team had worked for
years to design and build the
research station, including extensive
discussions and review sessions with
agencies such as ESA and NASA,
plus many conversations about the
experiments that designers planned
for orbit.
That doesn't mean there weren't
a couple glitches along the way,
though.
"We fixed a couple problems by
remote," Grilli said.
High radiation in orbit is
suspected of causing trouble for the
electronics on EuTEF, but the issue
was quickly fixed with a simple
reboot, Tominetti said.
Another glitch developed
because of the success of an
experiment studying static electricity
on the station. The device on
EuTEF designed to discharge
static electricity from the station
did what it was supposed to, but
that caused some concern when
controllers on Earth saw an electric
discharge around the station. Once
the experiment was tracked down
as the cause -- and then proven to
be working correctly -- the research
was turned back on.
Tominetti and Grilli watched
over the experiments package from
the European Space Agency's

Erasmus Command and Control
Center in the Netherlands.
"Having switched it on was
great," Tominetti said. "We see it
alive, like a little mechanical baby.
So we followed this growth for one
year and half, but it was sad to arrive
at the end, even though it was a
successful mission."
As Discovery headed into
space in August to equip the station
and recover EuTEF, the Earth-
bound controllers switched off the
experiments and set up the platform
so astronauts could safely detach it
from the Columbus lab and bring
it back aboard the shuttle without
damaging the valuable results.
The return trip called for a
whole new set of procedures for the
spacewalkers because the platform
Discovery carried to retrieve the
experiment set was different from
the kind EuTEF was bolted to when
it rode into space.
11t \as like designing a whole
new mission," Grilli explained.
The return capped seven years
of work on the project by the two
engineers -- work they would
happily repeat if called on for
another EuTEF mission.
It1 \ a very exciting, but
also a little bit sad, because the
mission being over, the story ends,"
Tominetti said.

Oct 30 2009

SPACEPORT NEWS

Page 3

SPACEPORT NEWS Page 5

ARES I-X: Putting the pieces together

By Anna Heiney
Spaceport News

'We've got a rocket'

The fast-paced assembly se-
quence of Ares I-X kicked off in late
2008, when flight hardware began
arriving at the Florida spaceport from
NASA field centers and contractors
across the country.
In order to handle the influx of
Ares I-X components, the process-
ing team needed more room than
the Vehicle Assembly Building's,
or VAB's, High Bay 3 and booster
facilities could provide. So elements
were stored, inspected, fitted or
joined together in additional facilities
across the space center, and even at
the Astrotech Space Operations facil-
ity in nearby Titusville, Fla.
The simulated upper stage ar-
rived in November 2008 aboard the
Delta Mariner barge after a journey
from NASA's Glenn Research Cen-
ter in Ohio. In January 2009, a plane
carried the full-scale crew module
simulator and launch abort system
from NASA's Langley Research
Center in Virginia to Kennedy Space
Center's Shuttle Landing Facility.
As assembly began, NASA
Vehicle Processing Engineer Trent
Smith was tasked with ensuring the
work was done in the right order and
that all necessary parts and personnel
were available.
"When the hardware started
showing up, I thought, 'Oh wow,
it's here,'" Smith said. "We've got a
rocket!"

Along with the crew module and
abort tower, the upper stage's seven
tuna can-shaped pieces, service
module, spacecraft adapter and two
interstate connectors were staged
in the VAB's High Bay 4 prior to
stacking.
The funnel-like frustum, for-
ward skirt with its extension, and
simulated fifth booster segment ar-
rived from Indiana, where they were
manufactured by Major Tool and
Machine. First-stage prime contrac-
tor ATK Space Systems built the four
solid-fueled booster segments, which
reached Kennedy in March 2009
after a seven-day, cross-country train
ride from Utah.

The stacking begins

Smaller sections called "super
stacks" were assembled first. The
two interstate pieces, frustum,
forward skirt and extension were
mated to the simulated fifth booster
segment in early July, completing
Super Stack 1.
A day later, the aft, or bottom,
segment of the first-stage solid
booster rolled into the Vehicle As-
semble Building and was secured to
the mobile launcher platform in High
Bay 3, marking the official start of
final assembly.
"When we started stacking, it

was a very big deal for us," Cow-
art said of the Ares I-X team. "We
stacked all four of the boosters, then
we were ready to bring over Super
Stack 1."
The first "tuna can" segment,
comprising upper stage segment 1,
was labeled Super Stack 2. Upper
stage segments 2 through 5 made
up Super Stack 3, and Super Stack
4 comprised upper stage segments
6 and 7. Segments 1 and 7 contain
steel ballasts weighing a combined
160,000 pounds to mimic the weight
of the Ares I liquid propellant tanks.
"I remember going up to Level
34 and looking down, and going on
the E roof-- which is right about
where the fifth segment simulator is
-- and looking up, then down," Smith
said. "That's when it really dawned
on us that this is a tremendously tall
rocket."
Barely five weeks after stack-
ing began, Ares I-X was crowned
with Super Stack 5, consisting
of the launch abort system, crew
module, service module and space-
craft adapter. The completed rocket
towered above the surface of the

mobile launcher platform, leaving only 10
feet of clearance for the heavy-lift crane
to remove the birdcage-shaped framework
that lowered the final pieces into place.
Assembly of the one-of-a-kind launch
vehicle finally was complete. But plenty of
work remained. The rocket was put through
its paces: a power-up test, or "smoke test,"
to validate the electronics boxes and wir-
ing; a s. ar test" to check the vehicle's
response to vibrations it could face during
rollout; instrumentation tests; and a simu-
lated countdown and liftoff.

Positioned for launch

Ares I-X emerged from the VAB at
1:39 a.m. EDT Oct. 20, beginning a 7.5-
hour trek through the predawn darkness to
Launch Pad 39B.
Ares I-X is the first new vehicle to oc-
cupy that pad in more than 25 years.
"For those of us who've lived with the
shuttle and grew up looking at the Saturn

Vs, it's obviously a little different than
what we're used to seeing," Cowart said as
the tracked crawler-transporter carried Ares
I-X to the top of the pad.
The rocket's upper stage loomed high
above the top of the pad's fixed service
structure, surpassed only by the pad's three
lightning masts.
Once Ares I-X arrived, remain-
ing milestones included a hot-fire of the
rocket's auxiliary power units and checkout
of the communications, instrumentation
and telemetry.
A successful liftoff capped a demand-
ing development and assembly process
that Cowart believes illustrated NASA's
entrepreneurial capability, as well as the
dedication of the relatively small team that

brought this flight from paper to
reality.
Smith emphasized that the Ares
I-X effort involved design centers,
research centers, and multiple con-
tractors -- all of which intersected at
Kennedy.
"There was some education on
all sides. Integrating and communi-
cating were key to our success," he
said. "What made it so rewarding
was working through all the chal-
lenges and frustrations."

The Ares I-X flight test vehicle
was still a concept about four years
ago, Cowart pointed out.
"This is unprecedented in
NASA history, for a rocket of this
size," he said. "It's incredible."

NASA/Jack Pfaller
Ares I-X segments are are positioned on the floor
of the Vehicle Assembly Building on Dec 8, 2008

NASA/Jack Pfaller
Segments of the first stage and the fifth simulator
segment make up Super Stack 1 on July 7, 2009

NASA/Jack Pfaller NASA/Jack Pfaller
The Ares I-X aft booster segment with the aft skirt Super Stack 3 hovers over Super Stack 2 in High Bay 4 of
is lowered into High Bay 3 on July 8, 2009 the Vehicle Assembly Building on Aug 7, 2009

NASA/Jack Pfaller NASA/DImItrn Gerondidakis
A crane lowers Super Stack 4, which is ready for integra- The "birdcage" lifts Super Stack 5 atop Super
tion, onto Super Stack 3 on Aug 12, 2009 Stack 4, completing the rocket on Aug 13, 2009

NASA/Kim ShItflett NASA/Kim ShItflett
Ares I-X began rolling out of the Vehicle Assembly The Ares I-X rocket was secured to Launch Pad
Building at 1 39 a m EDT Oct 20 39B at 9 17 a m EDT Oct 20

Page 4 SPACEPORT NEWS

Oct 30, 2009 Oct 30, 2009

STS-128 crew shares stories of mixing science with fun

All work and no play
... the thought is
nearly impossible
for a place without gravity.
For the crew of STS-128,
the International Space Sta-
tion was their playground.
. that is when they weren't
working to prepare the or-
biting laboratory for new
science experiments.
Commander Rick
Sturckow, Pilot Kevin Ford,
Mission Specialists Jose
Hernandez, Danny Oli-
vas, Patrick Forrester and
Christer Fuglesang returned
to Kennedy Space Center on
Oct. 22 to share their experi-
ences with the team that pre-
pared their launch vehicle.
After one scrubbed
attempt for finicky Florida
weather and another for
an issue with space shuttle
Discovery's liquid hydro-
gen fill-and-drain valve, the
crew lifted off just before
midnight Aug. 28.

NASA/Kim Shiflett
Mission Specialist Christer Fuglesang and the rest of the STS-128 crew returned to
Kennedy Space Center on Oct 22 to share their mission stories, spend time with

workers and sign autographs

"There is no experience
on the planet like leaving
the planet," said Ford, a
first-time space flier.
During the 14-day
mission, the crew delivered
the Multi-Purpose Logistics
Module Leonardo contain-
ing life support and sci-
ence racks, a new treadmill

named after Comedy Cen-
tral's Stephen Colbert, as
well as Expedition 20 Flight
Engineer Nicole Stott.
In their spare time, they
enjoyed their newfound
weightlessness.
Stott took time to
propel herself into Leonardo
and bounced off like a ball,

Hernandez enjoyed doing
summersaults, and the entire
crew liked to play with their
food ...
just don't tell their parents.
"Just take a water ball,
throw a lifesaver on top of
it, and then viola, you've got
an eyeball in space," said
Olivas. "Course, you've got
to get rid of it, so down the
hatch it goes."
Center Director Bob
Cabana and Sturckow go
way back. As commander
and pilot, respectively, of
STS-88 -- the first shuttle
mission to the station -- the
two astronauts helped con-
nect the first U.S. module
called Unity with the Rus-
sian-built Zarya module.
"I really envy Rick,
because Rick got to see the
space station at its very be-
ginning and he's seen it now
essentially complete. I think
it's pretty neat to be able to
bookend it like that," said

Cabana. "I would've done
anything to stow away with
you. I would've cleaned
windows, cooked food,
cleaned the toilet, whatever
you wanted."
Since the duo's first
boundary-pushing mission
in December 1998, the
station's size and diversity
has grown dramatically.
While in space, STS-128
marked the first time 13
crew members represent-
ing five countries have ever
been aboard a single, orbit-
ing spacecraft.
"We've had the good
fortune to watch it grow
from just a little-bitty space
station when Col. Cabana
was up there to a huge sta-
tion with as much internal
volume as a 747," said
Sturckow. "It's really im-
pressive. It's a credit to all
the great work done here by
hard working people at the
Kennedy Space Center."

Turbo team leader reaches new heights from hot seat

By Linda Herridge
Spaceport News
Interest in high-performance en-
gines is usually associated with
men. But for Jessica Tandy, a
turbo machinery engineer with Pratt
& Whitney Rocketdyne since 2005,
helping to process the space shuttle
main engines occupies most of her
work day at Kennedy Space Center.
"It's very exciting to work on
space shuttle main engines," Tandy
said. "They are very complex and the
learning opportunities are endless."
After Endeavour's STS-127
mission ended in July, Tandy served
as the move director-in-training dur-
ing the main engine removal process
in Orbiter Processing Facility-2.
She sat in the hot seat on the Hyster
forklift and focused on operating the
rail table, which is used to install or
remove engines, while communicat-
ing with technicians who were in the
aft compartment of the orbiter.
A critical element of engine

removal is aligning the "duck bills"
inside the main combustion chamber
after which the weight of the engine
is transferred from the orbiter to the
engine installer. Tandy said engine
removal takes about three hours
and engine installation takes about
four hours per engine, depending on
circumstances.
The engines were then transport-
ed to the Space Shuttle Main Engine
Processing Facility where they were
checked for leaks. They underwent
two-hour and then eight-hour drying
purges to remove moisture and were
lifted into vertical stands this week.
Technicians removed inspec-
tion port hardware so the blades and
bearings on the high pressure pumps
could be inspected. Tandy said static
inspections also were conducted to
inspect for anomalies, such as cracks,
contamination and erosion.
"Every component of the engine
is inspected to some degree and
many requirements must be satisfied

prior to engine installation," Tandy
said.
Since the flight readiness tests
are complete, the mechanical,
electrical, avionics, turbo pumps and
combustion engine groups are per-
forming final walk downs and will
start the process over with engine
installation for the next mission.
"Engine installation is one of
my favorite things to do," Tandy

said. "Seeing the engines interface
with the orbiter after weeks of prepa-
ration is very rewarding."
Though she is not the first
woman in the engine shop, Tandy is
the only woman currently training to
be an engine move director.
In addition to her current posi-
tion, Tandy also is a task team leader
on turbo pump removal and instal-
lation.

NASA/Jack Pfaller
Jessica Tandy, a turbo machinery engineer with Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, maneuvers a Hyster
forklift into a main engine on space shuttle Endeavour

SPACEPORT NEWS

Page 6

Oct 30, 2009

Remembering Our Heritage

NASA retires Tracking and Data Relay Satellite

By Kay Grinter
Reference Librarian S

After a rocky start and then a
stellar 26-year performance,
NASA's Tracking and Data
Relay Satellite-1, or TDRS-1, was
decommissioned Oct. 28.
Communications equipment
that links TDRS-1 to the ground has
failed, and without this capability,
it can no longer relay science data
and spacecraft telemetry to ground
stations on Guam and to the White
Sands Complex in Las Cruces,
N.M.
The satellite was deployed from
space shuttle Challenger in 1983
during the STS-6 mission, and was
the first and original TDRS-East.
In 1980, tentative timetables
called for the placement of the first
of six spacecraft in the Tracking
and Data Relay Satellite System, or
TDRSS, in geosynchronous orbit on
the fifth space shuttle mission, the
first operational flight of the shuttle,
and to have four of the satellites in
orbit by the end of 1982.
Shuttle delays and a problem
with the satellite's vulnerability to
broadcast frequency jamming pre-
vented the schedule from being met.
TDRS-1 was manifested for the
shuttle's second operational flight,
STS-6.
The late Art Sawyer, Kennedy
Space Center's launch site support
manager for TDRS, told Spaceport
News in 1980, that flying on one of
the first operational missions did not
add any pressure to his job.
"What does make TDRS satel-
lites particularly challenging to
coordinate," said Sawyer, "is the
number of different groups involved
in the project. Everybody's input
must be included."
"Everybody" meant managers
from several NASA centers, includ-
ing Marshall, Johnson and Goddard;
the joint U.S. Air Force/Boeing
team, suppliers of the upper stage;

More online
For more information about the
TDRSS Program, visit: scp.gsfc.
nasa.gov/sn/index.htm

NASA file/1982
The first Tracking and Data Relay Satellite and its inertial upper stage, the primary cargo for space shuttle Challenger's STS-6 mission, were installed into the
payload changeout room at Launch Pad 39A on Dec 27, 1982 Before the mission launched, a storm packing 70 mph winds penetrated Challenger's payload
bay, contaminating the satellite, and it had to be moved back into the room for inspection and cleaning of its solar array hinges

and representatives from Western
Union and their prime contractor,
TRW, builders of the system.
As launch of STS-6 approached
in 1983, the launch pad was subject-
ed to a storm on Feb. 28, packing 60
to 70 mph winds. TDRS-1, already
nestled in Challenger's payload bay,
was contaminated. The 5,000-pound
satellite, attached to its inertial
upper stage, had to be moved back
into the pad's payload changeout
room for inspection and cleaning of
its solar array hinges.
Following launch at long last
on April 4, a malfunction of the
TDRS-1 's inertial upper stage
booster placed it into an improper
but stable orbit.
Propellant already aboard
the satellite was used to fire the
spacecraft's tiny, 1-pound thrusters

throughout the next several months
to nudge it into a properly circular-
ized orbit.
The position of TDRS-1 over
the Indian Ocean successfully elimi-
nated the "zone of exclusion" in an
area where communications with
spacecraft were previously impos-
sible, providing true global cover-
age for all TDRSS users.
NASA has used the satellite
in ways never expected because its
orbital inclination has been chang-
ing almost one degree per year since
deployment.
In 1998, TDRS-1 provided the
first medical teleconferencing link,
complete with voice, video and
imaging data from the South Pole.
It was used again in July 2002 to
provide continuous, dropout-free
data during a two-hour telemedicine

event involving a physician at the
Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station
and physicians at the Massachusetts
General Hospital in Boston.
The first step in the decommis-
sion of TDRS-1 was to shut down
its critical payload systems. Maneu-
vers were executed to raise its orbit,
eliminating the potential dangers of
collision with other communications
satellites in geosynchronous orbit.
Ten satellites -- TDRS-A
through J -- successfully have made
it to orbit, although one was lost in
the Challenger accident in 1986.
A contract for two additional
satellites for the TDRSS network
was awarded to Boeing in De-
cember 2007. TDRS-K and L are
scheduled for launch in 2012.

SPACEPORT NEWS

Oct 30, 2009

Page 7

Page 8SPACEPORT NEWS Oct 30 2009

WORD THESTREET

Ares 1-X rolled out of the Vehicle Assembly Building on Oct. 20 at
1:39 a.m. EDT. How did you feel watching this significant milestone?

"Seeing the Ares 1-X rocket
on the mobile launcher was a
fantastic sight It's a monument
that represents the new era
in human spaceflight" -- Bob
Diehm, ASRC Aerospace Corp

I was awestruck by the height
of the rocket It's amazing what
we can do when we all work
together" -- Brian Hills, SGS

"We're moving forward
which is good, really good
-- Roland Benoit SGS

"As a brand new co-op to KSC,
this Ares 1-X rollout was a
phenomenal experience, even
if it was at 1 39 a m Andrew
Davis, NASA co-op

"I participated in building the
ground control system for Ares
I-X During the rollout, I was just
proud to be part of the project"
-- Doug Hammond, NASA

"I couldn't believe my eyes at
the spectacular sight of the
Ares I-X rocket when it began
rolling out of the VAB a truly
once-in-a-lifetime experience
--Melissa Clevenger, NASA

"What a thrill to be able to
witness the tallest rocket in
the world roll out and be a part
of history" -- Cathy Rauback,
Sierra Lobo Inc

"Truly surreal seeing a vehicle
other than shuttle rolling toward
the pad It really is the dawn of a
new era" -- Chad Carl. NASA

"I am very lucky and proud
to stand in the shadow of the
future" -- Ennis Shelton, Inno-
vative Health Applications LLC

Ares 1-X represents the begin-
ning of a new path in NASA's
efforts to explore other worlds
as well as a new era in U S
space history"
-- Tristan Clouse. Man Tech

"The mobile launcher platform-1 crew is very excited to be part of this
historic launch" -- From left, Kerry Raffety, Michele Leonhard, Bruce
Johnson, Carla Rekucki and Steve Cisewski, United Space Alliance

"History in the making" -- Erik
Murray, Innovative Health
Applications LLC

Goose bumps Wow, we have
finally got to this point Go
safety go Ares I-X" --
Eduardo "Ski" Jezierski NASA

"I was lucky to be going to a job
at pad A and was able to swing
by to see the rollout of the Ares
I-X, the new generation vehicle"
-- Lee Leland, NASA

Ares 1-X Bat Signal' appeared
to show the future of spaceflight
at KSC, an amazing sight"
-- Tim Van Nes, SAIC

"The last moon mission was the
year before I was born, so wit-
nessing this rollout and realizing
that we are heading back during
my lifetime was an indescribable
feeling"
-- Doug Grandey, Boeing Co

John F Kennedy Space Center

Spaceport News

Spaceport News is an official publication of the Kennedy Space Center and
is published on alternate Fridays by External Relations in the interest of KSC civil
service and contractor employees.
Contributions are welcome and should be submitted three weeks before publication
to the Media Services Branch, IMCS-440. E-mail submissions can be sent to
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Managing editor . . . ........ .................... Candrea Thomas
Editor . . . . ....... ........................ Frank Ochoa-Gonzales
Copy editor . . . . ....... ........................ Rebecca Sprague

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SPACEPORT NEWS

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Oct 30, 2009