Thanksgiving has always been a family holiday for me and when I went to England I was afraid that Thanksgiving wouldn't be the same spending it away from family. Instead, I gained an incredible new tradition of spending Thanksgiving with my Oxford football family with the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd annual OUWAFC Thanksgiving Extravaganzas. So naturally I was again fearful that, seeing as it was far too expensive to go home for just a few days over Thanksgiving, I wouldn't have any family to spend Thanksgiving with this year. I was saved by my amazing Basic Training roommate Vicki McBride when she invited me to Wichita to spend Thanksgiving with her, her husband Tim, and their other guests.
I drove up to Wichita on Wednesday after my first T-38 Sim (landed it on my first try :) ) and we stayed up way too late chatting and catching up. Also I got to "fangirl" a bit by looking at all the memorabilia that Tim has from his brother Brian (of the Columbus Crew/US mens national team/Everton/Fulham/Chicago Fire fame). Highlight was the jersey that Brian was wearing in the 2006 World Cup against Italy when he got is face bashed in by the elbow of Daniel De Rossi. It had obviously been washed but you could clearly see the bloodstains-- so cool!!
Thursday was Thanksgiving and I played Sous Chef to Vicki as she cooked up a great Thanksgiving feast of turkey, mash, sweet potatoes, corn, green bean casserole, homemade cranberry sauce, rolls, and cookies. It was nice to meet Vicki's squadmates and friends in Wichita and enjoy the holiday together. (And of course eat way too much food...)
On Friday Vicki and I drove to Hutchinson to visit the Cosmosphere, a space museum. Seeing as it was in the middle of Kansas, I didn't have much in terms of expectations but BOY WAS I WRONG! It was incredible!!! We spent ALL DAY at the museum and I could have stayed even longer.
The museum began in World War II with an exhibit about German rocketry, using that as the starting point of the space age. I learned loads about the V-1 and V-2 rockets that terrorized the population of Britain and learned a lot about the German infrastructure that created these rockets. Some intersting facts I learned:
-Werner Von Braun was imprisoned by the Nazis because he was too concerned with his rocketry research (looking for ways to get his rockets to space) and not concerned enough with militarizing them to support the Nazi cause. Its only because he was good friends with an influential general that he escaped execution for treason.
-The V-1 rocket (more of a flying bomb with a rocket motor than your stereotypical rocket) terrorized Britain in the beginning of the war but the Brits soon developed ways to fight against it. The most interesting was "rocket tipping": A British fighter would fly up next to the V-1, maneuver its wing underneath the wing of the rocket, then do an aileron roll. The aileron roll would impart a spin onto the V-1, causing it to go completely off-course and (hopefully) miss the centre of London.
-The Brits also succeeded in turning the German spies who were living in London and reporting back to the Nazis about where their rockets were landing. While the rockets were actually hitting directly where the Nazis wanted them, the recently turned spies reported back that they rockets were landing well east of the city, causing the Nazis to change their calculations and consequently make their rockets less accurate than they originally had been.
-Both the V-1 and V-2 were silent as they fell towards earth, albeit for different reasons. At the start of the V-1's descent, the change in pitch attitude was so drastic that the negative-Gs would cause the engine to sputter out and die, making the rocket fall silently down to earth. The V-2, on the other hand, traveled faster than its own sound waves, making it silent. The silent impact of the V-2 actually led Londoners to initially believe the large explosions were caused my gas leaks rather than bombs.
From the World War II section it went into a Cold War section which described the way in which the Americans and Soviets fought over the German rocket program and it highlighted the men in charge of the space programs on each side. The German rocket scientists knew the end was imminent but most of them were committed to the science they had been studying and wanted it to get into the right hands. Many of the scientists followed Von Braun's suggestion that they stick together and surrender (along with their technology) to the US soldiers. This was in direct disagreement to the decision made at Yalta that the technology discovered in the area that the US or the Soviets were to control would belong to that occupying nation. The headquarters of the rocketry was in the Soviet area but the American's smuggled out almost all of the technology and most of the scientists, leaving very little for the Soviets when they arrived.
From then on it became more of your typical "space museum", chronicling the history of the two space programs from the launch of Sputnik all the way through to the current commercial space interestest of Virgin Galactic and Space-X. Some highlights included:
Gus Grisson's Liberty Bell 7 Mercury Capsule:
Guss Grissom piloted America's second (suborbital) space flight but once he has splashed down his door malfunctioned and the explosive charge blew before he activated it and before the rescue craft was ready to recover the vehicle. Water began leaking into the capsule and Grisson had to be pulled out to keep from drowning. The helicopter tried to lift the capsule but the increased weight from the water threated to take down the helicopter and so the capsule was dropped to the bottom of the ocean and NASA failed to recover it.
In the investigation of what happened, Grissom swore that he had down nothing wrong and that the hatch just blew. However, with no reason to expect a malfunction and no craft to test, most engineers failed to believe Grissom. Grissom died in launchpad test fire of Apollo 1 and there were many who, until his death, believed that he had messed up and been responsible for the loss of the craft.
In 1999 the Cosmosphere decided to (with the help of the Discover Channel) sponsor a search for Liberty Bell 7 and, against terrible odds, discovered her on the ocean floor. They dragged her and restored the capsule for display in the museum. Examination of the craft led scientists to believe that blowing the hatch would have required extreme force and doing so would have left obvious bruise marks on Grissom, which he didn't have following the mission. The investigation led scientists to believe that Grissom had been truthful when he said he hadn't caused the hatch to open and he was vindicated. Interesting footnote: Grissom went on to be the commander of Gemini III and he named this capsule "Molly Brown"
Gemini X: This Gemini capsule was piloted by John Young (who would go on to be the commander of the first Space Shuttle mission) and Michael Collins (who would become the Command Module Pilot onboard Apollo 11).
Apollo 13 Command Module: The Odyssey
Everyone knows the story of Apollo 13 and if you don't, what rock have you been living under! The Cosmosphere had the restored Odyssey Command Module in which the Apollo 13 crew made their return to earth. SO COOL!
Some of the Mission Control computers from the Apollo Mission control:
These computers were used by the Flight Docs to monitor the medical status on the astronauts on the Apollo missions.
Moon rock: Just what it sounds like, its a moon rock.
There was too much stuff to actually be able to explain everything we saw but I will post more photos on Facebook and you can take a look at those.
Vicki and I just chilled and caught up some more on Friday night and on Saturday morning and I headed back to the Falls midday on Saturday. It was really great to get to see Vicki and Tim again. It had been 2 years since I had seem them at their wedding and that was far too long! Hopefully I will get to see them again sometime soon. I'm so thankful for great friends all over the country and world and for people like Tim and Vicki who opened their home to me so I could spend a holiday with my ever growing and expanding "family."
I drove up to Wichita on Wednesday after my first T-38 Sim (landed it on my first try :) ) and we stayed up way too late chatting and catching up. Also I got to "fangirl" a bit by looking at all the memorabilia that Tim has from his brother Brian (of the Columbus Crew/US mens national team/Everton/Fulham/Chicago Fire fame). Highlight was the jersey that Brian was wearing in the 2006 World Cup against Italy when he got is face bashed in by the elbow of Daniel De Rossi. It had obviously been washed but you could clearly see the bloodstains-- so cool!!
Thursday was Thanksgiving and I played Sous Chef to Vicki as she cooked up a great Thanksgiving feast of turkey, mash, sweet potatoes, corn, green bean casserole, homemade cranberry sauce, rolls, and cookies. It was nice to meet Vicki's squadmates and friends in Wichita and enjoy the holiday together. (And of course eat way too much food...)
On Friday Vicki and I drove to Hutchinson to visit the Cosmosphere, a space museum. Seeing as it was in the middle of Kansas, I didn't have much in terms of expectations but BOY WAS I WRONG! It was incredible!!! We spent ALL DAY at the museum and I could have stayed even longer.
The museum began in World War II with an exhibit about German rocketry, using that as the starting point of the space age. I learned loads about the V-1 and V-2 rockets that terrorized the population of Britain and learned a lot about the German infrastructure that created these rockets. Some intersting facts I learned:
-Werner Von Braun was imprisoned by the Nazis because he was too concerned with his rocketry research (looking for ways to get his rockets to space) and not concerned enough with militarizing them to support the Nazi cause. Its only because he was good friends with an influential general that he escaped execution for treason.
-The V-1 rocket (more of a flying bomb with a rocket motor than your stereotypical rocket) terrorized Britain in the beginning of the war but the Brits soon developed ways to fight against it. The most interesting was "rocket tipping": A British fighter would fly up next to the V-1, maneuver its wing underneath the wing of the rocket, then do an aileron roll. The aileron roll would impart a spin onto the V-1, causing it to go completely off-course and (hopefully) miss the centre of London.
-The Brits also succeeded in turning the German spies who were living in London and reporting back to the Nazis about where their rockets were landing. While the rockets were actually hitting directly where the Nazis wanted them, the recently turned spies reported back that they rockets were landing well east of the city, causing the Nazis to change their calculations and consequently make their rockets less accurate than they originally had been.
-Both the V-1 and V-2 were silent as they fell towards earth, albeit for different reasons. At the start of the V-1's descent, the change in pitch attitude was so drastic that the negative-Gs would cause the engine to sputter out and die, making the rocket fall silently down to earth. The V-2, on the other hand, traveled faster than its own sound waves, making it silent. The silent impact of the V-2 actually led Londoners to initially believe the large explosions were caused my gas leaks rather than bombs.
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| The V-1 "Buzz Bomb" |
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| A Spitfire "Rocket Tipping" |
From the World War II section it went into a Cold War section which described the way in which the Americans and Soviets fought over the German rocket program and it highlighted the men in charge of the space programs on each side. The German rocket scientists knew the end was imminent but most of them were committed to the science they had been studying and wanted it to get into the right hands. Many of the scientists followed Von Braun's suggestion that they stick together and surrender (along with their technology) to the US soldiers. This was in direct disagreement to the decision made at Yalta that the technology discovered in the area that the US or the Soviets were to control would belong to that occupying nation. The headquarters of the rocketry was in the Soviet area but the American's smuggled out almost all of the technology and most of the scientists, leaving very little for the Soviets when they arrived.
 |
| Interesting comparison between Sergei Korolev and Werner Von Braun, the two men in charge of the Soviet and US space programs, respectively. Can't really read it though... sorry |
Gus Grisson's Liberty Bell 7 Mercury Capsule:
Guss Grissom piloted America's second (suborbital) space flight but once he has splashed down his door malfunctioned and the explosive charge blew before he activated it and before the rescue craft was ready to recover the vehicle. Water began leaking into the capsule and Grisson had to be pulled out to keep from drowning. The helicopter tried to lift the capsule but the increased weight from the water threated to take down the helicopter and so the capsule was dropped to the bottom of the ocean and NASA failed to recover it.
In the investigation of what happened, Grissom swore that he had down nothing wrong and that the hatch just blew. However, with no reason to expect a malfunction and no craft to test, most engineers failed to believe Grissom. Grissom died in launchpad test fire of Apollo 1 and there were many who, until his death, believed that he had messed up and been responsible for the loss of the craft.
In 1999 the Cosmosphere decided to (with the help of the Discover Channel) sponsor a search for Liberty Bell 7 and, against terrible odds, discovered her on the ocean floor. They dragged her and restored the capsule for display in the museum. Examination of the craft led scientists to believe that blowing the hatch would have required extreme force and doing so would have left obvious bruise marks on Grissom, which he didn't have following the mission. The investigation led scientists to believe that Grissom had been truthful when he said he hadn't caused the hatch to open and he was vindicated. Interesting footnote: Grissom went on to be the commander of Gemini III and he named this capsule "Molly Brown"
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| Liberty Bell 7 |
Gemini X: This Gemini capsule was piloted by John Young (who would go on to be the commander of the first Space Shuttle mission) and Michael Collins (who would become the Command Module Pilot onboard Apollo 11).
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| Gemini X |
Apollo 13 Command Module: The Odyssey
Everyone knows the story of Apollo 13 and if you don't, what rock have you been living under! The Cosmosphere had the restored Odyssey Command Module in which the Apollo 13 crew made their return to earth. SO COOL!
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| The Odyssey |
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| Inside the Odyssey |
Some of the Mission Control computers from the Apollo Mission control:
These computers were used by the Flight Docs to monitor the medical status on the astronauts on the Apollo missions.
Moon rock: Just what it sounds like, its a moon rock.
There was too much stuff to actually be able to explain everything we saw but I will post more photos on Facebook and you can take a look at those.
Vicki and I just chilled and caught up some more on Friday night and on Saturday morning and I headed back to the Falls midday on Saturday. It was really great to get to see Vicki and Tim again. It had been 2 years since I had seem them at their wedding and that was far too long! Hopefully I will get to see them again sometime soon. I'm so thankful for great friends all over the country and world and for people like Tim and Vicki who opened their home to me so I could spend a holiday with my ever growing and expanding "family."
