MDRS Crew #62

(December 8th-23rd, 2007)

Images shot on Dec-14th, 2007.
Shot with a Nikon D40

(Click on any thumbnail to see a larger 1504x1000 JPEG image)

Fri Dec 14th, 2007

Jon Deices a door	Tom & Jon in greenhab	Don & Jon work on a fuel line
Jon and Chris work on a water pump problem	added new AC line to run new sump pump	new AC line
Chris & Jon work on a fuel line	Chris & Jon work on a fuel line	Chris & Jon work on a fuel line
Chris & Jon work on a fuel line	Chris & Jon work on a fuel line	Chris & Jon work on a fuel line
new aux fuel line connected	fuel overflow	bad seal?
checking air filter	fuel line valve	lunch
icy water	pumping icy water	icy water
antarctica	pump problems	Musk Obs
Musk Obs	monitor problems	missing serial card
missing pci serial card	connections	telescope controller
velcro with new white trim	velcro with new white trim	velcro with new white trim
diesel leak	bad hose	pump leak
pump leak	pump leak	MDRS-62
pier not level	Tom observes	Tom observes
Jon Observes	Jon Observes	Cathy Observes
Cathy Observes	Cathy Observes	Hab & Jon
Musk & Jon	Musk & Jon	Musk & Jon
Musk & Jon	Musk & Jon	Musk & Jon
Musk & Jon	Musk & Jon	Moon as seen @ Musk Obs
Moon as seen @ Musk Obs	Moon as seen @ Musk Obs	Moon as seen @ Musk Obs
Moon as seen @ Musk Obs	Moon as seen @ Musk Obs	Moon & Musk @ dusk
Moon & Musk @ dusk	Moon & Musk @ dusk	Moon & Musk @ dusk
Moon & Musk @ dusk	Moon & Musk @ dusk	Moon & Musk @ dusk
Moon & Musk @ dusk	MDMoon & Musk @ duskRS-62	supper
Cresent Moon Mosaic
Moon & Musk composite
supper	Mars	Mars with B5 lens flare
M-42 1/2 sec	M-42 5 sec	M-42 10 sec
M-42 15 sec	M-42 20 sec	M-42 25 sec
M-42 30 sec	Orion 70mm f/5.6 < 30 sec	Orion 70mm f/5.6 < 30 sec

I have always been amazed to see how different could two following days be. Yesterday was tense and everything we tried failed. But fortunately, today has been different. The fog is gone and has been replaced by a gorgeous sun which helps us to defreeze the water trapped in the hoses and pumps. In addition, Jon was in a generous mood after the movie and he allowed us to sleep one hour more to compensate with the bad day we all had.

Jon, Ben, Chris and I have been working on a lot of different engineering issues today and we are proud to say that the station is now in a lot better shape than it was a day ago. We finally succeeded in refilling our potable water tank inside the Hab which means that we can now wash our hands, clean the dishes, and cook again. We also fixed the fuel line to automatically refill the generator. Concerning the GreenHab, the grey water system in charge of bringing grey water back to the toilet for flushing, seemed to work efficiently and we are ready to plant vegetables tomorrow.

Our “Engineering Tasks” white board is almost full of red checks meanings “the job is done” and Catherine drew a happy face with a nice thank you note for us, the engineers! We really worked hard these last days to try to fix the engineering problems as much as possible. We hope that it will continue to work well and that we will have more time for EVA and some more fun experiments in the next days. Also, Mission Support just told us today that we may have some new ATVs soon.

Around 5pm, before the sky gets too dark, everybody received a call from Ben on the radio. “Does anybody want to see the Moon?”. We went up to the Observatory and saw our beautiful Moon. I am convinced that I was not the only one dreaming to be there one day. We then had a nice dinner cooked by Jon and we wrote our reports in spite of a bad internet connection. For now, I need to go for another night at the Observatory, the stars are calling me!

Web Pages by Ben

Photos by Ben Huset

Last revision Dec-14th, 2007
by Ben

Counter started Dec 14th, 2007   -
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