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From the (Library) Bookshelf: Shuttle, Houston
When, a little while ago, I got around at last to signing out something new from one of my library’s ebook lending services I was hit with error messages. After a little while I sorted out that my library card had to be renewed every so often; having let it expire does pretty much seem a reproach. It was easy enough to have it renewed by going to the closest branch, though, and there I started signing out books in print again. Checking one familiar section I came across a book called Shuttle, Houston by Paul Dye, identified on the cover as “NASA’s longest-serving flight director.”
The book opens with a scene in mission control during the final space shuttle mission. At first I thought “I don’t remember this happening during it”; I then started wondering just how they had got out of the situation; then, I thought “Oh, right.” With that attention-geting hook delivered, Dye explains how he started working for NASA the year before the first space shuttle launches and spent years working his way up through the ranks. When mentioning an early experiment controlled by an 8-bit microprocessor he misattributes the 6502 to Motorola rather than MOS; with all the technical details of genuine importance to his career he had to keep track of over its length, though, I can suppose I ought to be forgiving.
A good background was offered to the workings of mission control and the space shuttle itself before descriptions of specific incidents from its later decades. Perhaps more conscious of disdainful judgements of the program than of the patriotic support that did hold up in other areas at the same time, I might have wanted to see more of “how we kept going despite everything” than the book did include. Dye does talk about the nation as a whole losing resolve and, while mentioning the space shuttle could not just launch cargo into space but return much more of it to Earth than a re-entry capsule, insists accelerating to orbital speed has slim margins for safety; unfortunately, I did wonder about that just amounting to “becoming more conscious of the risks there from the start.” He did, anyway, also mention a mission control slogan about “making things look unexciting,” which seems to tie into familiar complaints often posed without suggestions for improvement, even if at the very end of the book he did make some lamenting comments about institutional arteries hardening with age and managers replacing leaders, also familiar enough from other directions.
The book opens with a scene in mission control during the final space shuttle mission. At first I thought “I don’t remember this happening during it”; I then started wondering just how they had got out of the situation; then, I thought “Oh, right.” With that attention-geting hook delivered, Dye explains how he started working for NASA the year before the first space shuttle launches and spent years working his way up through the ranks. When mentioning an early experiment controlled by an 8-bit microprocessor he misattributes the 6502 to Motorola rather than MOS; with all the technical details of genuine importance to his career he had to keep track of over its length, though, I can suppose I ought to be forgiving.
A good background was offered to the workings of mission control and the space shuttle itself before descriptions of specific incidents from its later decades. Perhaps more conscious of disdainful judgements of the program than of the patriotic support that did hold up in other areas at the same time, I might have wanted to see more of “how we kept going despite everything” than the book did include. Dye does talk about the nation as a whole losing resolve and, while mentioning the space shuttle could not just launch cargo into space but return much more of it to Earth than a re-entry capsule, insists accelerating to orbital speed has slim margins for safety; unfortunately, I did wonder about that just amounting to “becoming more conscious of the risks there from the start.” He did, anyway, also mention a mission control slogan about “making things look unexciting,” which seems to tie into familiar complaints often posed without suggestions for improvement, even if at the very end of the book he did make some lamenting comments about institutional arteries hardening with age and managers replacing leaders, also familiar enough from other directions.