Riding Rockets - Mike Mullane [139]
Weeks later, during a STS-51B simulation, the Sim Sup introduced a simulated monkey “malfunction.” It wasn’t a herpes outbreak, but a monkey death. This was to help prepare the MCC PR people to deal with nightmare antivivisectionists scenarios. (A group of these people were protesting NASA’s Spacelab animal experiments.) Per Sim Sup’s instruction, the crew reported the simulated monkey was sick and bloated. A short while later they made the “monkey has died” call. At about the same time in the simulation, Sim Sup also introduced a human medical problem for the MCC flight surgeon to work—pilot Fred Gregory was ill with a fever and a urinary tract infection. The nearly simultaneous monkey illness and Fred’s simulated infection had Fred vigorously defending himself in the simulation debriefing: “I did not violate the monkey!”
The herpes-infected monkeys made the flight and, as far as anybody knew, none of the crew caught the virus, not even the marines. And neither did any of the monkeys later give birth to an air force pilot’s simian bastard. Nor did Fred come back with a urinary tract infection.
At another meeting one of the female physician astronauts presented some life-science findings derived from Spacelab animal experiments. “Newly born mice appear healthy but, in weightlessness, they are unable to stay on their mother’s teats to nurse.”
The comment elicited a Beavis and Butt-Head reaction from the Planet AD crowd. “Dude, she said teats.” A wave of giggles swept through our ranks. One USMC astronaut whispered, “Sucking tit in zero-G sounds like a job for a marine.”
Another life-science experiment presented to astronauts involved the insertion of an instrumented hypodermic needle into an astronaut’s body to measure zero-gravity veinous blood pressure. A Spanish Inquisitor would have blanched at the size of the experiment needle. I asked, “Where are you going to find a vein large enough to stickthat ?”
Physician (and former marine fighter pilot) Norm Thagard joked, “The dorsal vein of the penis will work.” On Planet AD everybody was a comedian.
The briefer assured us the penis would not be a target, but wherever the needle was destined it wasn’t going to be fun. Needle-oriented experiments always seemed to be part of Spacelab missions, a fact that generated this office joke.
Question: “Why do Spacelab missions require a crew of six MSes/PSes?”
Answer: “Five are needed to hold down the experiment victim.”
At yet another Monday meeting the topic was the STS-51F space cola war between Coke and Pepsi. That mission carried experimental zero-G-functional cans of each soft drink. The crew was to evaluate them in the hope carbonated beverages could be added to the menu. Not surprisingly, both soft drink companies wanted theirs to be the first cola consumed in space and called for their political connections to make that happen. Astronauts would hear the issue had reached all the way to the White House. A disgusted John Young returned from one management meeting and said the first-cola-consumed-in-space topic had occupied hours of the committee’s time. That prompted a growl from the back ranks: “Sure hope they’re spending as much time working on the things that can kill us.”
As the Coca-Cola Company was the first to come to NASA with the suggestion of flying their product, they won the battle. The 51F crew was ordered to take photos of the consumption of the drinks with the date/time recording feature of the NASA cameras in the on position. That data conclusively established that Coke was the first cola consumed in space. But since shuttles have no refrigerators, the beverages had to be consumed at room temperature. That fact doomed the experiment to be a disappointment. STS-51F was the first and last cola flight.
On January 27, 1986, I jumped in a T-38 and, along with the rest of the STS-62A crew, flew to New Mexico for some payload training