Monday's Preparations for Flight

Here she is! The Zero G 747 aircraft that we will be flying in on Tuesday and Wednesday. Today was spent getting our experiment ready for flight.


We are on the aircraft loading our equipment. You can see the target in the back, and the launcher will be placed 12 feet in front of target. Right behind our target is the cockpit. So cool. If you look closely at the walls, you can see that they are padded for everyone's protection!!!



Here we are walking on the tarmac to load our hardware on the plane. It is a lovely 67 degrees today. As we look left, we can see Tomahawks, and beyond that is Homeland Security. Definitely no pictures taken looking left. Nor do we dare pass the red line between Ellington Field and the Coast Guard. We would be taken away in handcuffs! Not sure if someone would come and get us! How cool is that!




Here we are in Hanger 900 with our mentor Heidi. She has been a great resource along the way. She is an engineer for NASA and works in Mission Control for the International Space Station! What a fascinating job she has. She will be flying on the Tuesday with Mrs. Fortuna.





One of the main focuses after we got our hardware ready to go, was an intense TRR (Test Readiness Review). This was a group of NASA employees that are specialized in Safety during flight. We were interviewed by this large group and had to prove that our experiment and hardware would be safe in this reduced gravity environment. As you can see in the picture, there were over 30 people involved with this TRR. We were a bit intimidated, but thank goodness we passed. The only suggestion made was that we wear safety goggles for the person standing near the target. One of the Engineers from this group made a special point to introduce himself. Evidently he has been through Solon Springs on his way to the Boundary Waters!

We were also issued our green flight suits today! We even got a name tag to attach to our suit. Stay tuned for pictures.

The last briefing we had reviewed how to avoid getting sick during our flight. Somersaults and turning head from side to side quickly, were not advised. We also need to make sure we do not eat greasy foods or citrus before the flight.