“Dale, will your people be configured for vehicle closeout in time?”
“In time and on time. Barely.”
“Good. Joe, what about integration with the Russians once Endeavor is airborne?”
“The Soviets will launch a little after midnight our time the morning of the 18th. As I understand it, Shuttle will launch at 10 o’clock that morning Eastern Time. Soyuz should arrive at the target about 90 minutes later, just before Shuttle’s rendezvous with LACE. Because the SoyuzTM has rather limited, orbital maneuvering capabilities due to her small fuel reserves, they will need the whole eleven hours to shoot their rendezvous with LACE. Their rendezvous will require just less than eight orbits.”
“What about air-to-air communications with the Russians?”
“General Breyfogle, there probably will not be any Soviet comm with our ground stations. They use very different radio frequencies from our FM channels, as you know. Soyuz and Endeavor may have air-to-air voice contact by UHF radio, normally only used by Shuttle for the last minutes of the approach and landing sequence. Am I correct, Admiral?”
“As always, Joe.”
“What about the risk to Soyuz from LACE? Can Soyuz be damaged by another lucky shot by LACE, Mr. Secretary?”
“We don’t know for certain, Major. Our best intelligence suggests that all Soviet offensive missiles and military satellites are ‘hardened,’ as we say, against laser attack. We estimate their offensive missiles for the last few years have been hardened against laser radiation along the lines of two-tenths kilojoules per square centimeter. That is a measurement of laser focusing energy. Their warheads are hardened against seven kilojoules per square centimeter. That may insulate Soyuz sufficiently if it is also hardened to the warhead range of protection. As most Soyuz and Salyut space station missions are military in nature, we can only presume that they are hardened. That kind of armor may account for their limited maneuverability. We are not sure.”
“Seems you are not sure about a lot of things, Mr. Secretary.”
“That may be, Commander Rusinko… But our people have never shot down a Russian satellite with an offensive weapon which was not supposed to be there in the first place.”
Joseph Vazzo spoke through clenched teeth at the silent Navy officer. The Admiral shuffled his papers and all eyes were on him.
“Gentlemen, it’s two o’clock in the morning and we’re all a little tired and short on patience… One more detaiclass="underline" What about handling the press on this one — a joint space flight out of the blue and a bumped Shuttle crew, all in three days? How are we going to ice the cake? Mr. Young?”
“Admiral, we’ve worked out this scenario at the Cape. Tomorrow morning, we will issue to the wire services a routine statement announcing an emergency repair mission to the lost Intelsat-6 satellite. No press conference, no hoopla. We’ll announce the mission on the premise of a sudden degradation of the Intelsat’s orbit. We will analogize the situation to the unexpected re-entry of our Skylab space station over Australia in ’79. We’re still smarting from that one. The Soviet participation will be announced by stating they will be there to confirm that Intelsat does not re-enter the atmosphere over Soviet air-space. We’ll thank the Russians for their rapid, international cooperation. A true handshake in space equal to the joint Apollo-Soyuz Test Project flown in 1975. All quite tidy.”
“About tidiness. How is it that the Russians are ready to go so quickly, and with an English-speaking crew?”
“Maybe Joe can respond to that one?”
“We’ve wondered about that, too, General. Our theory is that Soyuz was already set to go, probably to back up a ferry Cosmos, such as Cosmos 1267, which is their killer-satellite series. They were probably already targeted for LACE. As for their English-speaking crew, they may have changed crews just as we have.”
“They wouldn’t dare go after LACE alone…
“Dare what, Colonel? Wouldn’t dare attempt to take down a rogue satellite? Do I have to remind you of the applicable law of the sea here?” Joseph Vazzo rubbed his tired eyes. “Our crime here is nothing less than space piracy…”
“Piracy, Mr. Secretary?”
“Complete with the black flag, as far as our space treaty with the Russians is concerned, Admiral.”
“Early for a swim, isn’t it, Jack?”
The brawny technician smiled at Jacob Enright, who was raising his fish-bowl helmet to his head. The clock above them on the wall read 7 a.m., Houston time.
“You know that the Colonel and I work the swing shift, Chief,” Enright grinned.
“From the poop I hear upstairs, I’d say your night-shift days are about over. What say?” The big man fiddled with a hose connection on Enright’s bulky white pressure suit.
“Think so?”
“Poop has it you ’n’ Colonel are flying, and soon. Somethin’ hush-hush.” The smiling deck-crew chief spoke toward Parker, who stood in his faded flightsuit beside Enright. “You boys must know someone.”
“Reckon so,” the Colonel drawled.
With his helmet secured to his full suit, Jacob Enright balanced on the wire basket at the side of the Johnson Center’s neutral buoyancy pool. Submerged 40 feet deep in the 1.3-million-gallon pool, a full-size mockup of an open Shuttle payload bay shimmered. Both Enright and Parker felt an eerie twinge reminding them of Monday’s simulated landing which ended in the drink, at least on paper.
Strapped to Enright’s back was a full-size model of the Martin Marietta Manned Maneuvering Unit, the MMU.
Ordinarily, shuttle crews train in watery, simulated weightlessness in the pool at the Marshall Space Flight Center at Huntsville. But there was no time to fly from Houston to Alabama.
“Tell you boys another thing,” the technician said as he gave Enright a cheery thumbs-up. “That ain’t no Intelsat down there, either.”
The engineer regarded the cylindrical black hulk which floated 10 yards to the side and slightly above the sunken payload bay’s sill, near where the open bay door would be in space.
Neither pilot replied.
“Basement, please, ladies’ intimate apparel.” The voice crackling from the wall-mounted loudspeaker belonged to the space-suited Enright, who perched ankle-deep in water upon the grating of the steel elevator at poolside.
The lift groaned and descended into the clear water. Enright’s helmet just cut the surface as a Navy safety diver below the surface reached up for the weights fastened to the ankles of Enright’s bulky EVA suit. Two divers on either side of Enright steered him from the submerged lift toward the Shuttle payload bay. With one diver holding each of Enright’s legs, they guided his feet into the foot restraints bolted to the bay’s floor.
“Don’t make a wish,” Enright’s voice laughed over the wall speaker as each diver held one of his legs.
Behind the neckring of the suit, a few bubbles percolated upward from the MMU’s air supply. Quickly, the bubbles stopped. As in space, the cumbersome manned maneuvering unit on the pilot’s back did not vent his breath overboard.
With weights precisely positioned about his ankles, thighs, wrists, and lower back, Enright’s air-filled space suit was perfectly balanced in the water. He was, in fact, weightless, as he would be 130 nautical miles into the airless sky.