11:30pm: This Is What We Can Do
"CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (April 16, 2002 7:47 p.m. EDT) - NASA's most experienced spacewalker and his rookie partner concluded work on the international space station's new 44-foot girder Tuesday and hung powerful floodlights outside the orbiting outpost.
It was the fourth and final spacewalk for the visiting astronauts of space shuttle Atlantis, who are due to leave on Wednesday...
...The spacewalkers attached a 14-foot guide rail and smaller handholds to the girder and put shock absorbers on the railcar that rides a track on the beam. They also set up a radiation monitor outside the space station as well as a gas-sniffing gauge to detect any ammonia coolant leaks.
The framework will extend more than 350 feet by 2004 as more and more girders are added to the one delivered last week by Atlantis.
Ross and Morin, along with fellow spacewalkers Steven Smith and Rex Walheim, spent nearly 30 hours outside during their weeklong station visit. Almost all their work was with the $790 million girder and railcar." (By MARCIA DUNN, Associated Press)
I watch as "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "Star Wars" become a reality, not to mention "1984" and "Brave New World." And I don't want to complain, here, but we can do this, and at the same same time our guys are up there reinventing the galaxy my teammates and I are driving home from our football game on Saturday in Rod-Man's S.U.V., it's 76-degrees out, there's a thermometer on the dashboard, and we listen as the weatherman announces--not forecasts, just announces--the current Central Park temperature as 66-degrees. I mean we're 4 blocks from Central Park and it's 76-degrees. Forget about an accurate forcast, which we haven't had in light years; can we at least get an accurate reading on the thermometer?
Amazing. But I'm not one to complain, so you ain't heard it here...
Posted by cronish at April 17, 2002 11:48 PM