Riding Rockets

Judy referred to a torso photo in the checklist to ensure we had positioned the sensors correctly. The photo was of a man’s chest, his nipples being the landmarks used in positioning the sensors. Those of us from Planet AD had jokingly complained of the sexism represented in the photo. There were female spacewalkers, too, we argued. The checklist should also have a photo of a woman’s naked chest showing the sensors properly applied. One AD male cut out aPlayboy model’s photo, drew in the biosensors on her naked breasts, and pasted it into an EVA checklist. He said he was going to clandestinely substitute it for the actual checklist in his next training session with a female spacewalker, but I never heard about the prank being executed, so I suspect he chickened out.

We continued with the rest of the dress-out. We pulled on our pants, waddled into the airlock, and squatted under the wall-mounted torso/arm pack. While Judy held the suit arms vertical, I drove my head and arms upward and into the torso part of the suit. The squeeze through the neck ring ripped at my ears and made my eyes tear. Judy locked the pant waist to the torso, then dropped my helmet into place and locked that down. She next pushed on my gloves and locked those to the wrist rings. It had taken the better part of two hours, but I was now fully dressed. The training session would go no further. If I released myself from the wall mounts, as I would have to do on a real space-walk, I would collapse under the 300-pound weight.

Judy finished dressing Hawley but before she could get out of the airlock, I encircled her and pulled her into my front in a writhing hug. She laughed. The embrace was as sensual as a fair maiden hugging an iron-suited knight.

Hawley and I had graduated. We were ready for a spacewalk. And as much as each of us wanted to do one, we both prayed it wouldn’t happen. If we were on a spacewalk, it would be to save our lives.

Friday, April, 13, 1984, proved to be a very lucky day for the “Zoo Crew.” STS-41C landed at Edwards AFB. We were next. We were Prime Crew. With that title came top priority for simulators and T-38s. For me, it also brought Prime Crew night terrors. Until this moment every time my soul tried to deal with the fear and joy of what was fast approaching, I disallowed it. STS-6’s IUS failure, STS-9’s hydraulic fire, and STS-41B’s twin satellite booster failures had made me a skeptic. There was too much in front of us that could jeopardize our mission. Even now, with the horizon clear of any other shuttle missions, I kept my emotions on a very short leash. Until the hold-down bolts blew there were no guarantees, I told myself. An engine could blow up in a ground test and stop the program. My health could become an issue. The payload contractors could find something seriously wrong with their machines. There were thousands of unknowns in this business.Don’t even think about flying in space, I ordered myself. And during my waking hours I obeyed that order. I had plenty of distractions. However, in sleep, the reality of being Prime Crew would creep past my defenses. I would bolt awake with my heart wildly drumming and my brain overwhelmingly aware that I would be next off the planet. Every fear I had ever harbored about death aboard a space shuttle, every doubt I had ever held about my competence to do the mission, every joy I had ever celebrated at the thought of flying into space would flash through my consciousness in a wild, chaotic fury and vaporize any hope of further sleep. I would get up and go for a walk or run.

By this time “Zoo Crew” had been together for fourteen months and we’d be together a few more. Because of delays in earlier missions,Discovery ’s launch had slipped to June. In our thousands of hours of training Judy and I had become close friends and I would be a liar if I said I hadn’t thought about expanding our relationship beyond the study of payload checklists. That thought was certainly nibbling at me as our T-38s landed on a warm spring Sunday at the KSC shuttle landing strip. Judy and I were there, alone, to support some payload tests that would begin the following day. We jumped into a rental car for the drive to the KSC crew quarters. Wearing Prime Crew smiles, sitting in a convertible (top down, of course), dressed in our blue flight suits, the wind in our hair, the sun on our face, we were everybody’s image of the Right Stuff.