Mission Update

The library was crowded with people, listening to Wynoah, the Public Affairs Officer, and Bryson, the Commander of the shuttle, talk about what their jobs were and how they felt about the whole thing. The rest of Mission Control was seated on the floor, listening. When the speeches were finished, we took a last look at the shuttle, and then hurried to the lab to say our scripts for the launch. The scripts are what the real NASA astronauts say during the launch. The lanch itself went well, despite the fact that it was a few minutes late because there were so many people and media milling around. The script went well, and everyone knew what to say. Everyone was very nervous, with reporters and parents breathing down our necks, and trying to read our scripts by the light of our computer screens. It was quiet, except for when people were following the script, but the pressure was high in the room, no-one wanted to make a mistake in front of the media. The whole process took about 10- 15 minutes. Thankfully, the astronauts blasted off into space safely and as planned. - Willow, CAPCOM.

Press Conference and Launch

Today, December 16th, 2003, our class came bright and early to prepare for the Space Shuttle Launch. We were all feeling excited but a bit nervous. The day we had been preparing for had finally arrived. At 8:50, our guests came for the press conference. There were many people that attended the conference from the Department of Education as well as local politicians and the press. The conference was meant to get everyone interested and informed about our project. Ms. Tillett, Wynoah and Bryson spoke about how we began the project and how much we have learned. They also talked about how they are feeling, what they think will happen and what everyone’s job is. The conference went smoothly and our guests were very intrigued. After the conference Wynoah gave the guests a tour of the space shuttle. It was made out of PVC piping and white plastic. They were amazed from the shuttle looking so real. They were also astonished by the work our class put into the project. They were so interested in the space shuttle that we had a delayed lift off. After the tour, we had a very successful launch. We followed a lift off script from NASA to make the launch more realistic. The launch instructions were sent over walkie-talkies.

Everyone is busy at Mission Control and it looks like Exodus, the shuttle, will have a great flight.

Millie and Wynoah, Public Affairs

Lunch

When the astronauts had their first lunch, not all went well. Bryson, the commander, cooked two boxes of orange cheese macaroni for three people and Ben, the pilot, cooked one box of white cheese macaroni for two people. Two astronauts had tea and the rest had lemonade. They also shared some apples and an orange. When they tasted the food,Ben said that the orange cheese macaroni tasted like toothpaste. Ewwww! Molly1 said that the taste wasn’t so bad but the texture made it really hard to eat. Some of the other astronauts thought it was like playdoh. Another astronaut said the lemonade smelled like puke. After lunch, they had too much orange cheese macaroni,poured some of it down the sink and it got clogged.

Lets hope supper goes a lot better than this!

Millie, Public Affairs

The Astronaut's Behavior

At the beginning of the mission, all the astronauts were really happy and went straight to work but as time went on, they started to lose focus and got off track. Soon they were back to normal and busy with their experiments,exercising and posting journal entries. With all of the seven astronauts in such a small space together,they started to get on each other’s nerves and were getting annoyed by their fellow astronauts. Soon it was lunch and all was well. After lunch, everyone on the shuttle started going psycho. They were spinning on chairs and calling each other weird and made up names but now at 9:00 p.m., they assure me that they are fairly normal again and working busily.

Millie,Public Affairs

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