Archive for November 26, 2013

Where Astronauts Train! (Part 2)

As mentioned in my last post, a personal dream came true when I visited the NASA – Johnson Space Flight Center in Houston last month.  This blog will explore the SPACE VEHICLE MOCKUP FACILITY, or “the place where the astronauts train.”

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THIS IS A MOCKUP OF A SMALL PART OF THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION (ISS).  ASTRONAUTS TRAIN INSIDE.  I WAS NOT ABLE TO GET A PICTURE OF THE ENTIRE MOCKUP OF THE ISS BECAUSE IT IS SO BIG!

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THE GRAY ORB IN THE FOREFRONT OF THIS PICTURE IS A MOCKUP OF THE SOYUZ CAPSULE THAT TAKES THE ASTRONAUTS AND COSMONAUTS BACK TO EARTH.  IT FITS ONLY 3 PEOPLE.

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THIS IS A PICTURE OF A ROBOT.  THEY ARE PROGRAMMING ROBOTS TO DO THE SET UP FOR EXTRA VEHICULAR ACTIVITIES (EVA’S).

A dangerous part of a space mission is when astronauts perform EVA’s.  If they were to puncture their space suit with a tool, death would be imminent.  To reduce the time spent outside the space station, robots have been programmed to set up the site that the astronauts will be working on.  What ingenuity!

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A MOCKUP OF THE ORION SPACE CRAFT THAT WOULD LAND ON MARS.

Recently, astronauts were training on the Orion mockup on how to launch it into space.  In astronaut lingo, they were practicing “ASCENT SIMULATIONS”, which are rehearsals of the steps the Orion’s crew would be responsible for during their climb into space.  This would include scenarios of things that could go wrong.

I hope y’all can make it to Houston someday to visit the NASA – Johnson Space Flight Center.   Tours are open to the general public.  As our tour guide, Helen Lane explained, “NASA is open to everyone because it belongs to the citizens of America.”

In the meantime, I am dreaming of the day we will land a man, or better yet, a woman on the planet Mars.  Hoping it will be in my lifetime!  Bon Voyage!

A Dream Come True…A Visit to the NASA-JOHNSON SPACE FLIGHT CENTER (Part 1)

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“HOUSTON, TRANQUILITY BASE HERE.  THE EAGLE HAS LANDED!” were the first words spoken on the moon by Neil Armstrong on July 20, 1969.  On that hot summer day, I was sprawled out on our living room floor with my family, watching this great moment in history take place on our television.  Soon after the lunar module landed on the moon, the cameras flashed back to Mission Control in Houston, Texas.  All of the men at Mission Control had huge grins on their faces and were letting out huge sighs of relief!  (Back then, only men were working at Mission Control.  Years later, during a shuttle launch, I was ecstatic to see women had entered this domain.)  So it was a dream come true for me when I took a field trip last month to the Mission Control Center at the NASA-Johnson Space Flight Center.  Here are my photos from this amazing and inspiring adventure.  Enjoy!

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HELEN LANE, PHD, RD IS THE LADY IN THE BLUE SUIT.  SHE IS THE MANAGER OF THE UNIVERSITY RESEARCH & AFFAIRS FOR NASA.  SHE ALSO WAS THE FORMER NASA CHIEF NUTRITIONIST.  WHAT A GREAT TOUR GUIDE! 

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MISSION CONTROL.  THE SCREEN SHOWS ACTION AT THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION IN REAL TIME.  IF YOU LOOK REAL CLOSE, YOU CAN SEE AN ASTRONAUT FLOATING AS HE COMPLETES HIS DAILY TASKS.

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THE MIDDLE SCREEN SHOWS THE LOCATION OF THE SPACE STATION ABOVE THE EARTH…WHEN I WAS THERE IT WAS OVER THE ATLANTIC OCEAN AND EUROPE

Mission Control is manned 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.  The mission controllers work nine hour shifts.  One hour of their shift overlaps with the previous shift.  The Flight Director is the person who is in charge and is responsible for the safey of the spacecraft.   The CAPCOM mission controller is the person who is the main communicator with the astronauts.  A physician is a part of the team also.  Doctors play a critical role during space walks and other extra vehicular activity, monitoring vital signs of the astronauts.

You can’t see it from the pictures I took, but astronauts get around the space station like they are Super Man flying and grabbing bars to propel themselves forward.  Dr. Lane made me chuckle.  She recounted that every astronaut has told her that when back to earth, he or she inevitably tries to continue floating.

Adam and I have had the thrill of seeing the International Space Station orbit above our Huntsville home.  If you want to find out when the space station will be visible from your home town, you can go to www.spotthespacestation.nasa.gov or www.isstracker.com

I was a fan of space flight before visiting the NASA-Johnson Space Flight Center.  My tour here made me fall even more in love with human space flight.  I will close with a funny comment by my husband, who works at the NASA-Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL.  Helen Lane said because the space flight facility is on federal government land, it has multiple uses, and  longhorn cattle serenely graze on the land here.  When I told my husband about the longhorn cattle at NASA, he remarked, “Hmmm, I did not know NASA was in the Space Rodeo business too!

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A Place At The Table

We are expected to get our first frost of the season tonight.  The weather outside today was cold and windy.  Not as cold and windy as my great home State of Wisconsin gets…but my fellow Alabamians were freezing their bottoms off.  They are weak!  Smile.  It was the perfect evening to have a potluck at the Trinity United Methodist Church.  The North Alabama Food Policy Council sponsored the event and all of the dishes came from foods grown in Northern Alabama.

The highlight of the evening was the showing of the documentary, “A PLACE AT THE TABLE”, shedding light on the problem of hunger in the United States.  Three low-income families in rural Colorado, rural Mississippi, and Philadelphia, PA were interviewed on how hunger affected their family.  This post will share my learnings and hunger statistics from this movie.

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When many people think of hunger, they think of emaciated people in third world countries experiencing famine.  Thankfully, starvation is not rampant in the USA. However, food insecurity is prevalent and growing.  Food insecurity is when a person does not know when their next meal is coming from.

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One in six Americans do not have enough to eat.  30 percent experience food insecurity.  My neighboring state of Mississippi has the highest rate of food insecurity.  They also have one of the highest rates of diabetes in the country. I hope to write more in depth about the relationship between poverty and diabetes in a future blog post.

Did you know fruits and vegetables have become more expensive since 1980?  Did you know that processed foods like ramen noodles have become more cheaper since 1980?  The rates of diabetes have risen since then.  Correlation?  There is more than one cause of the increased rates of diabetes in the USA, but this certainly is a contributing factor.

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235 million Americans live in “Food Deserts.”  These are places where fresh foods are not available to the population.

Did you know the average food stamp budget is three dollars a day?  (The modern name of the food stamp program is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP.)

The United States, according to the IMF, has the worst record of food insecurity among advanced countries.

Half of all children in American  will receive food assistance in their lifetime.  85% of food insecure people have one person in the family in the work force.

Kathryn Strickland, Director of the Food Bank of North Alabama, closed the evening with local hunger statistics and HOPE.  Her food bank gave away 7 million pounds of food last year.  They served about 100,000 people.  This is about the size of the cities of Decatur and Florence Alabama combined.  32,000 of the people served were children.

A current strategy of the Food Bank of North Alabama is to offer grants to assist small farmers to sell their produce to local schools.  This is a WIN-WIN.  The small farmers will get more money for their produce.  The school children will be getting more locally grown fruits and vegetables in their diets.

50 million Americans are food insecure.  Strategic thinking by people like Kathryn Strickland are helping to make sure these people will have “A PLACE AT THE TABLE.”

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Speak Out On Behalf Small Farmers!

Farmers Markets are the bomb!  You get to meet the farmers who harvested the food you are purchasing.  They get to keep more of their profits when they sell produce at Farmers Markets.  When I attended the Greene Street Farmers Market here in Huntsville recently, I got to learn about proposed public policy.

Volunteers at the market were educating attendees about the Food Safety Modernization Act.  How could there be any controversy regarding food safety?    After all, everyone wants to avoid diarrhea and/or death from food poisoning!  Unfortunately, the cost of compliance with this legislation could put small farmers out of business.  The FDA estimates the average cost of implementing the produce rule for a “very small farm” ($25,000 to $250,000 in annual sales) amounts to $4,697 per year and a “small farm” ($250,000 -$500,00 in annual sales) amounts to $12,972 per year.

One of the things I love about Farmers Market is the wide variety of produce available.  During my recent foray to the Farmers Market, baby beets, curly kale, sweet potatoes, collards, potatoes, squash, and muscadine grapes were a few of the fruits and vegetables for sale at one farmer’s booth.  This law would require costly fencing be built around all these different vegetables and fruits.  Additionally, farmers would have to pay for costly testing and treatment of their water.

My friend, Youlanda, and I recently discussed this proposed legislation.  You “met” Youlanda in my June 5, 2013 and September 30, 2013 blog posts.  She is the daughter of a Black farmer.  She knows very well the back-breaking labor that goes on in the farming busines.  Youlanda exclaimed, “These regulations will run small farmers out of business.  If my father was still farming, there is no way he could afford to put fences around all the different vegetables he grew.  Also, it’s not the small farms where Salmonella and Shigella outbreaks occur.  My Dad farmed for over fifty years and there was never a case of food poisoning with his produce.”

As a fan of Farmers Markets, I have observed that a greater variety of produce is available there.  If more small farmers go out of business, less variety will be available to the consumer.

You can do something to help the small farmer.  The Food and Drug Administration is taking comments on this piece of legislation until 11/15/2013.  If you want to get more information on how to help the small farmer, you can log onto the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition’s Website: http://sustainableagriculture.net/fsma

You can send your comments via snail mail at:

Division of Dockets Management (HFA-305)

Food and Drug Administration

5630 Fishers Lane, Room 1061

Rockville, MD 20852

If you wish to email comments go to Regulations.gov  You can comment on the Produce Rule (FDA-2011-N-0921) or the Preventive Controls Rule (FDA-2011-N-0920).  (You can comment on both rules, but you must comment separately)

THANKS FOR HELPING TO SAVE SMALL FARMS!

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Hiking the Buggy Top Trail in Tennessee

What a perfect autumn day!  My friend, Amy, joined Adam and me for a hike on the Buggy Top Trail near Sewanee, Tennessee.  I hope you enjoy the following pictures of the fall foliage.  Also, there is something you can do to save the declining bat populations in America.  Read on!

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THE ROCKY TRAIL HEAD OF THE BUGGY TOP TRAIL

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FANTASTIC FALL FOLIAGE

Did you know the State of Tennesse has the most caves in the United States?

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AMY AND ADAM PEER INTO THE DEEP CAVE

Here is what YOU CAN DO to help save bats.  Many of these mammals live in caves.  Since 2007 to 2008, millions of insect-eating bats have died in 22 states across America.  They are dying from WHITE NOSE SYNDROME.  Caused by the evil bacteria, g. destructans, signs include white fungal growth on a bat’s muzzle or wing tissue.  They also exhibit abnormal hibernation behavior with this syndrome.  They begin to make day flights in the winter and this causes them to lose their protective winter fat stores, and then they die.  There are severe economic consequences to declining bat populations.  It is estimated that 40 to 50 billion dollars have been lost since this epidemic began.  This is because insect-eating bats devour pests that affect farmers crops.  Rangers at the South Cumberland State Park exhort hikers to stay out of caves.  They are worried that hikers are bringing in the deadly cause of the bats’ demise on their hiking boots.

What a treat it was to hike with my friend, Amy, who is an awesome naturalist.  She taught me that the plant below was WILD GINGER.  We also spotted tiny lizards on the hike, and she informed me the correct name of these lizards was ANOLES.

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WILD GINGER

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THE ROLLING LANDSCAPE OF TENNESSEE

Looking for a pretty place to hike?  Try the BUGGY TOP TRAIL in Tennesse!  Just stay out of the caves!