Riding Rockets

Coverall-clad technicians awaited us in the suit room. Our bright orange LES pressure suits were draped on five La-Z-Boy–type recliners. Name tags on each recliner indicated which suit belonged to which astronaut, and every name but Pepe’s was misspelled. He had snuck into the suit room earlier and made the bogus name placards in retaliation for our wearing of a prototype mission patch that bore his unusual French-Canadian-rooted name (Thuot) misspelled as Thout. We all laughed. Anything to ease the tension was welcome. I took a seat in the recliner marked “Mollane.”

I removed my wedding band and put it in my glasses case. The ring could snag on something in an emergency escape. I would put it back on when I reached orbit. I had done the same thing for STS-41D and STS-27 and had come back alive. The act was now a ritual as much as a ballplayer’s crossing himself in the batter’s box. I had to survive to put the ring back on. God knew that and would protect me. Or, so I hoped.

The technicians helped me wiggle my feet into the bottom of the rear-entry suit. I then stood and zipped the integrated anti-G bladder around my gut. Next, I lowered my body and simultaneously inserted my arms into the suit’s armholes while pushing my head through its neck “dam.” The last time I had squeezed my head through an opening as tight as the LES had been at birth. The ring was intentionally made small so the rubber dam would clamp tight around the flesh of the neck and prevent the suit from filling with seawater.

After zipping the back of the suit closed, the technicians continued the dress-out. They laced my boots and buttoned my Snoopy-cap communication carrier on my head. Next came the pressure suit gloves. Finally the helmet was locked onto the neck ring. I was now fully dressed for the two things I never wanted to experience…a cockpit depressurization and/or a bailout from a wounded shuttle.

The techs connected their pressure test equipment and gave me my instructions. “Close your visor, turn on your O₂, take a deep breath and hold it.” In the silence of the suit, my nervousness was obvious. I could hear my heart. It was squishing in my ears.

Next came a fully pressurized test. I gritted my teeth for this. As the suit filled with oxygen it stiffened to the consistency of steel. It felt as if a cinch was being run across each shoulder and through my crotch and then tightened until my prostate was in danger of being cleaved in half. Fortunately the test only lasted thirty seconds. I wasn’t worried about dealing with the pain aboard the shuttle. If the suit ever pressurized in flight it would be because we had lost our cockpit atmosphere. In an emergency that dire, any suit pain would be insignificant.

The suit check was nominal and the technicians removed my gloves and helmet. They handed me a tray of items to stow in my pockets. I loaded a gas-pressurized space pen in the left-sleeve pocket and checked that my parachute knife was in my “pecker pocket,” a sleeve on the inside of the left thigh. If I became entangled in my parachute and was being pulled to my death at sea, I could use the knife to hack at the shroud lines and hopefully save myself.

In my right thigh pocket I placed my spare glasses. In addition to my wedding band, I had secreted my mom’s Psalm 91 in the case. Technically, the latter item was contraband, but it would only be discovered if Jim Bagian and Sonny Carter were cutting the suit from my dead body. In that case I wouldn’t care. In the same pocket I also loaded a radiation dosimeter, some aspirin for the zero-G backache that awaited me, and a Ziploc bag for stowing my used diaper once I was in orbit. I also included a barf bag. While I had yet to feel the slightest nausea in space, carrying the bag had become another ritual, as if that act alone prevented space sickness.

In my right ankle pocket I placed a mirror. The immobility of the suit made it impossible to look at the hose connections, so a mirror was needed. I also stowed my right pressure suit glove and tethered my bailout survival radio.

In my left ankle pocket I placed my left glove and more survival equipment: flares, strobe light, and flashlight.Who am I kidding? The fall is gonna kill me anyway.

As I was finishing with my stowage, some NASA photographers entered the room and snapped a few pictures. We all assumed casual, not-a-care-in-the-

world, lying smiles.