Riding Rockets

That label had never really been defined, but it was easy to sense how most of NASA and all of the public interpreted it.Operational meant the shuttle was nothing more than a very high-flying airliner. I doubt there was a single military aviator astronaut who believed that. Fighter jets of far less complexity than the shuttle routinely suffered malfunctions resulting in crashes. We were certain one awaited the shuttle, too, and when it happened, it would mean death for her crew. While the operational label was nebulous, it did contain one certainty—all future shuttle missions would be flown in vehicles with no in-flight escape system. There were no ejection seats inChallenger ’s cockpit and the two inColumbia would soon be removed. That had been the plan from the very beginning. President Reagan’s “operational” declaration was merely photo-op tensile. But contained in it was a shuttle design feature that would condemn some of us to death.

With flight crews named to all the planned missions through 1983, I knew I would not be getting a flight assignment for many months, perhaps even a year or more. But at least my purgatory of Spacelab support had ended. I was now assigned to shuttle software checkout in the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory (SAIL). My frequent partner in that facility was the now very pregnant Rhea Seddon. She and Hoot Gibson had married in 1981 and their first child was due in July. In the SAIL cockpit I would watch Rhea’s nine-month distended belly crowd the control stick as she flew simulations to perfect landings. It was a sight certain to have sent some of the old Mercury astronauts fumbling for their nitro pills. Rhea would ultimately give birth to a son, one of the rare boys born to astronauts. We had long noticed a propensity for astronauts to sire daughters and wondered if the G-forces of our jet-jockey training were pushing male sperm to the end of the line. As Hoot and Rhea were being congratulated at a Monday meeting, one pilot shouted, “This proves Hoot isn’t an astronaut.” I answered, “No. It proves Hoot isn’t the father.” Rhea had a good laugh at that.

I enjoyed Rhea immensely. Like Judy, she was a smart and capable beauty with a limitless tolerance for us AD males. She frequently parried our sexist BS with biting humor. I once saw Hoot, our AD King, skewered with it. One of the men chosen to sit on an upcoming astronaut interview board had ducked his head into our office and asked for inputs on the selection criteria for the new class of astronaut candidates. Hoot gave Rhea a body-appraising scan and answered, “Yeah, how about selecting some women with big breasts and small asses instead of the other way around.” Rhea smiled wickedly at her husband and replied, “Robert, some night while you’re asleep, I’m going to amputate your penis [she was a surgeon] and graft it to your forehead, and when you come to work people are going to think it’s a zit.” Hoot had married perhaps the only woman on the planet who was his equal. When they were together it was a laugh a minute. I loved them both.

By 1982, like the other AD men, I had learned my boundaries around the six females. Rhea’s and Judy’s were the widest. Sally’s were the tightest. Though I repeatedly warned myself to watch my mouth around Sally, I would have relapses, as when I once observed, “The female cosmonauts are sure ugly.” Sally snapped, “Have you ever thought they might be good at their job?!”

Alcohol always held the potential to wreck my resolve. One evening, as Donna and I walked from a local restaurant (after a dinner that included more than a few beers), a friend stopped Donna and they fell into conversation. As I dallied, I noted Sally and Steve Hawley at another table dining with an attractive woman I didn’t recognize. At the time, Steve was dating Sally so there was nothing surprising about seeing them together. With my wife engaged I walked over and said, “Hey, Stevie, are you getting cookie recipes from these girls?” Sally glared at me like I was something growing in her bathroom grout. Hawley cringed as if he had taken a bullet to the gut and shot Sally a glance that said, “I don’t know this guy.” There was an awkward silence during which the unidentified woman examined me as if I were whale shit, the lowest thing on the planet. Finally, I bid a good-bye and escaped back to my wife, my hands discreetly checking the zipper of my fly as I walked. The threesome’s rude reaction made me wonder if I had forgotten to zip up after my last visit to the urinal. Nope, everything was secure.

As I returned, Donna’s friend gushed, “You know her?!”

Of course, I assumed she was referring to Sally.

“Sure, that’s Sally Ride.”

“No, not her. The other woman.”

“No. I wasn’t introduced.” I was still puzzled by that table’s hostility toward me. Was it something I said?

“That’s Jane Pauley.”

I shrugged. The name was a mystery to me. “Who’s Jane Pauley?”