Other Sessions
In addition to the Training Missions and Extended Mission there were a number of other sessions to attend. One of the most interesting was the Underwater Astronaut Trainer (UAT).
This is a tank which allows the trainees to work in neutral bouyancy on a mock-up satellite in conditions as near to weigthlessness as can be found on earth (apart from flying the vomit comet plane).
Before trainees are taken down, they go through a complete set of drills to handle the basics for safe scuba diving.
After feeling weightless in the UAT, you can then be spun up to three times your normal weight on the centrifuge,
or feel what it is like to walk on the moon in the one sixth gravity chair,
while the rest of the team looks on.
One thing about the one sixth gravity chair is that it always seemed to make people break out in silly faces ...
Now the wonderful thing about one sixth chairs
and one sixth chairs are a wonderful thing
your legs they feel like rubber
and your tail feels just like a spring
you go bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy
bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce, bounce
the wonderful thing about one sixth chairs
is you all get to try it out once!
As well as these practical sessions, there were a number of lecture sessions ranging from Astronomy to Orbiter Systems. Here I am shaking hands with Konrad Dannenberg who gave a talk on his work under Wernher von Braun on the A4 (V2) through to Saturn V rockets.
