What A Day At NASA!

Oh my!  We had a terrific day at NASA in Houston!  Anne Roemer, a ‘97 grad of Roanoke a College (Major=International Relations), is the Director Of Human Resources for all Federal employees at the Johnson Space Center.  “Everything I needed to know about HR I learned as an Admissions Tour Guide at Roanoke!”  I MADE THAT UP. SHE DIDN’T REALLY SAY THAT.  But it does beg the question...
Anyway, we had dinner with Anne and her family last night and then met her at 8:15 this morning to begin our “Inside-the-Gate” tour.  First stop was the building housing a full size, actual hardware of the Saturn 5 rocket!  Amazing.  This is a shot of Jen and Paul I front of one of the engines.

Then we went to Mission Control watch the actual live Space Station Mission.  There was a live camera feed from he space station and all kinds of data screens; nothing drastic happening, but to witness the coordinated control of this complex program was humbling.

Then we went to a simulation lab where they have full scale mock-ups of present and future spacecraft.  We went into the space shuttle model and Jen immediately sat down in the command pilot’s seat and invited me to be co-pilot. Some things never change...

While we were in this building, 2 astronauts were on their way to a meeting and they greeted Anne with huge hugs.  We had our picture taken with them.  Both have been on the space station.

Our last stop was in Building 16 where Paul worked as an engineer many years and 2 lifetimes ago.  An engineer named Mike had done some background on me and knew which room my old office was!  Nothing looks the same, but it was kind of full circle to walk that hall again.

Our new best friend, Mike, works on spacecraft avionics.  He took us to a lab where there was another another full scale mock up of the shuttle; with all the systems wire EXACTLY like the real shuttle.  Again, we sat in the pilot’s seats and then marveled at the miles and miles of electrical cables required to make the shuttle work.

What a wonderful visit.  Anne and her husband Wes (who works in the space bio-medical field) gave us the royal treatment.  What a blast!

Now we are just on the edge of Austin, Texas, at a magnificent state park campground.  The sun has set and so must I.  A great day!