Category: space geekery
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rite of passage
Adam Savage has been posting videos of his visits to the Smithsonian where he meets with conservator Lisa Young, who specializes in preserving historic objects connected to the U.S. space program. In this video she’s telling Adam how teams of women spent weeks and weeks building up the heat shield on the Apollo crew capsule Read.
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spaced
This is a terrific video, not because Adam Savage nerds out over the Mercury capsule behind him but because astronaut Cady Coleman talks about how it felt to go to space in a very small space ship and what it meant to her. She’s really great at communicating that feeling. Read.
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#thanksoppy
Fare thee well, Opportunity, and we thank you. Read.
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Alan Bean
Fare thee well, Alan Bean, and thank you. It has been, and continues to be, a heartbreak to lose people who have dared to do great things. With Alan Bean’s passing, there are just four living people who have walked on the moon: Dave Scott & Jim Irwin, Apollo 15: July 30 to August 2, Read.
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John Young
Fare thee well, John Young, and we thank you. Read.
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Gene Cernan
Fair winds and following seas, Eugene Cernan. Read.
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chills
New favorite moonshot find on the internet: recordings of the intercom chatter between flight director Gene Kranz and the members of the “White Team” that were on duty when an oxygen tank blew up on Apollo 13. The cool of these guys is jaw-dropping, especially Sy Liebergot, the guy who eventually noodled out what had Read.
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garble
I’ve passed some time these last two weeks reading the Apollo Flight Journal, an annotated transcript of the transmissions from the astronauts who went to the moon. This is some pretty geeky stuff. The transmissions themselves would be nerdtastic all by themselves, but the annotations are so packed full of detailed moon-shot minutia that I Read.
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walking on the moon
After our weekly visit to the farmer’s market on Madison’s west side, My Darling B and I crossed the street to the Hilldale Mall where B had to shop for a dress to wear to a wedding. B hates shopping with the blazing white intensity of a thousand exploding suns, but the wedding is just Read.
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stockings
I wasn’t sure why at first, but this photo of Christmas stockings hanging over a doorway (next to an upside-down Christmas tree) on the International Space Station warmed my heart: The photo was posted by Samantha Christoferetti in the on-line journal she’s been keeping while serving on Expedition 42 to the ISS. One of the Read.
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