posted 02-21-2010 12:17 PM               

I also saw a thread with a John Glenn interview from 1961 where he addressed this problem directly. In fact, a video shows an astronaut in the vomit comet actually turning over as he attempts to manipulate a bolt.

My question is simple. To what extent was NASA prepared for the difficulty of working in space? Were they surprised, was the problem a matter of degree or were they unaware of the trouble trying to work in space would be?

The seeming familiarity of John Glenn with the difficulty clashes with Cernan's account of how unprepared he was.

posted 02-21-2010 06:57 PM            

In particular, the underwater work funded by NASA Langley predicted the problems that would be experienced by Cernan, Collins and Gordon on their Gemini EVAs, but NASA Houston did not accept Langley's insights until almost too late.

In addition, judging from the debriefs, it seems that the teams training the various Gemini astronauts did not always completely integrate their lessons learned.

posted 02-21-2010 11:03 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Duke Of URL:
I've seen documentaries and read books where Gene Cernan and others talk about how we "forgot" Newton's laws when it came to space walks and doing work in zero-g.

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posted 02-23-2010 12:23 AM               

In Cernan's case, he wasn't the victim so much of training wrong or doing necessarily the wrong things, but also by the equipment. All those factors contributed. The ideas that they tried on Gemini 9 were to use the tether as a means of locomotion by snapping it kind of like a whip. He didn't have the fancy manuevering gun Ed White had to pull him out and back to where the AMU was bolted to the craft. The Gemini craft also had no hand holds aft of the entry hatches. So one might liken it to climbing rocks in zero gee as you don't make much progress if you can't get a hand on anything. As such, he could maybe hand hold the teather down to the Gemini, but once he let go and tried to cling to the craft, he would end up floating away again. Getting back in the Gemini also was a chore (as it was with White's spacewalk) as you try to get in and seated, yet you bounce in the seat and begin to float back out again. In a sense, what could have helped that would have been a simple grab bar at the bottom of the instrument panel to brace one's self inside.

But at the same time, Gene also overheated partly due to the Gemini suits using gas temperature to regulate the suit temperature. As such, getting overworked in the suit resulted in heat buildup (not helped by a tear in the thermal insulation in the back of the suit) and that resulted in Geno sweating in the suit so bad that he fogged up his visor. Both Mike Collins and Dick Gordon encountered similar problems. The heating crisis wasn't solved until Hamilton Standard working on the life support system for Apollo came up with the liquid cooling system which is still used today in shuttle EMUs. Indeed the suits today get torture tested before flight by the astronauts as they essentially work out in the suits to raise their body temperature to see how the suits will cope.

As for Buzz, on Gemini 9 when they had the launch shroud not come off the Agena Docking Target vehicle, mission control discussed what could be done and Buzz suggested Geno should spacewalk over with a pair of cutters and cut the strap. NASA heads who heard this wondered what the guy was thinking as it sounded nuts due to the potential dangers involved with all the stored energy of the strap during cutting. One apparently even wrote after hearing this that he didn't want Buzz Aldrin flying ANY mission in space.

By the time Gemini 12 flew, the EVA plans were curtailed quite a bit as mission planners realized they were a bit too ambitious in their goals. Water training helped, but the first EVA was a standup one as I recall and for the second one where Buzz went fully outside, the Gemini was equipped with plenty of handholds and footwells to get to the aft portion to do work and to the Agena itself. Buzz did very well on his energy management, not overworking himself or getting the suit temperature too hot. In a sense, while he didn't necessarily earn an Apollo 11 seat (that decision was a couple years away yet) he did certainly earn his astronaut wings and respect. Prior to the flight, when there were plans to potentially fly the AMU on Gemini 12, Deke still wanted Gene to fly it since he had the most experience with AMU training for Gemini 9, even though Buzz was prime crew for 12. But when the AMU was removed from the manifest, Buzz got his shot and he went all the way with it.

posted 02-25-2010 08:28 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Jay Chladek:
If Dave had done an EVA, he probably would have done okay since the tasks weren't quite as ambitious as trying to get to the back of the craft to strap in and fly the AMU.

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posted 02-26-2010 11:16 AM               

In prior training, the crews had used zero-g aircraft flights to get the feel of weightlessness and to devise techniques for working. But experience had shown that this kind of training was useful in a very limited way, mainly for practice in getting into or out of the spacecraft. Pilots had to move fast and brace themselves before the airplane finished the Keplerian trajectory with its high-g pullout. In space, they found that everything had to be done slowly and deliberately.

posted 02-26-2010 09:50 PM               

Upon learning that he would be backup pilot on Gemini 9 and learning that he'd train to use the AMU and "fire its hot little rockets to fly around in space":

Charlie and I buckled down to work. We planned to overcome the problems that Ed had encountered the old fashioned way -- with brute strength -- because we had no other alternative.

One of the first examples of how things were moving too swiftly came with my spacewalk. Ed's only jobs were to test the spacesuit, a hand-held propulsion device, and the umbilical cord... Now we leaped to an unrealistic schedule of two and a half hours of hard work for me... Good idea, but faulty assumptions...

I hadn't even done anything yet and was already losing the battle. There had been no advance warning on the difficulties I was having because everything I did was new. I was already beyond the experiences of White and Leonov...

...we had just not anticipated the problems astronauts would encounter if they tried to work, as well as just walk, in space... Dr. Charles Barry observed, "The difficulty of physical labor in a hard-suit environment is one of the big revelations coming out of this flight."

posted 03-03-2010 11:11 PM               

Gene also mentioned his suit was a bit stiff and part of his problem was overcoming the inflated nature of it, which even at 5 psi (compared to zero psi outside) made the thing act like a balloon. The suit designers on Apollo came up with the convolute design for the joints and that helped quite a bit to overcome the limitations of the previous joint designs. Of course, experience had to be gained on how NOT to do something before headway was made in how to do it.

posted 03-04-2010 03:23 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by Jay Chladek:
As for Buzz, on Gemini 9 when they had the launch shroud not come off the Agena Docking Target vehicle, mission control discussed what could be done and Buzz suggested Geno should spacewalk over with a pair of cutters and cut the strap.

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