Testimonial: Valerie Alvarado, MSFC
“Those were a tough couple of months. I say months - it felt more like a couple years. And just a lot of long nights. You can ask my husband, he’s getting ready for bed and I’m still at my desk, writing emails…
“We were nervous, all of us were. It was like a big anvil cloud hanging over everyone. Here was, really, the flagship vehicle of the program, and the whole idea that this, Ares II, even this engine, was the backbone of everything. And we felt like, was all of it at stake here? There was talk at headquarters about decrewing station if we couldn’t get Orion flying again, and all of it hinged on the flight five investigation.
“Well, ultimately, I think the outcome was the best it could have been. I mean, you never want a situation like this to begin with, but what we saw was that our failure mode, really, was isolated to Ares II, and we all breathed such a sigh of relief. And that meant we could get Orion back in the air, we could get back to doing rotations. And we still lost some sleep getting the feed issue resolved, but I think it really validated the whole concept of this architecture. That decision to separate your crew, your astronauts, from your cargo - and that goes back to Augustine, goes back to the ESAS people. It was a tough situation, but I think it was a win, in the big picture, for a choice made all the way back at the beginning.”
Valerie Alvarado, MSFC
Hello! I've got a fun little spaceflight alternate history project that's been in the works for some time, and I thought it could be interesting to post some content here and see how it does.
The title might offer you a hint at the overall idea of this timeline. My end goal right now is just to produce a single "white paper" document that covers the major story beats from the perspective of a specific piece of the puzzle. But while I work on getting that document done, which will be maybe a few pages at most, I thought it could be fun to have a thread going where I can drop little nuggets and spinoffs as I think of them.
Some of y'all who know me elsewhere will know what's going on, but I might encourage you to keep it sealed over here just because I'm curious to see people's response as information is revealed. I'll add a disclaimer for the more experienced members of this forum that the foundation of this story is pretty silly, and my challenge was to see what kind of narrative I could build up around a fundamentally unlikely premise.
That said, have fun, and I'll see you soon for the next bit, whatever that may be!
- Beverly
“We were nervous, all of us were. It was like a big anvil cloud hanging over everyone. Here was, really, the flagship vehicle of the program, and the whole idea that this, Ares II, even this engine, was the backbone of everything. And we felt like, was all of it at stake here? There was talk at headquarters about decrewing station if we couldn’t get Orion flying again, and all of it hinged on the flight five investigation.
“Well, ultimately, I think the outcome was the best it could have been. I mean, you never want a situation like this to begin with, but what we saw was that our failure mode, really, was isolated to Ares II, and we all breathed such a sigh of relief. And that meant we could get Orion back in the air, we could get back to doing rotations. And we still lost some sleep getting the feed issue resolved, but I think it really validated the whole concept of this architecture. That decision to separate your crew, your astronauts, from your cargo - and that goes back to Augustine, goes back to the ESAS people. It was a tough situation, but I think it was a win, in the big picture, for a choice made all the way back at the beginning.”
Valerie Alvarado, MSFC
Hello! I've got a fun little spaceflight alternate history project that's been in the works for some time, and I thought it could be interesting to post some content here and see how it does.
The title might offer you a hint at the overall idea of this timeline. My end goal right now is just to produce a single "white paper" document that covers the major story beats from the perspective of a specific piece of the puzzle. But while I work on getting that document done, which will be maybe a few pages at most, I thought it could be fun to have a thread going where I can drop little nuggets and spinoffs as I think of them.
Some of y'all who know me elsewhere will know what's going on, but I might encourage you to keep it sealed over here just because I'm curious to see people's response as information is revealed. I'll add a disclaimer for the more experienced members of this forum that the foundation of this story is pretty silly, and my challenge was to see what kind of narrative I could build up around a fundamentally unlikely premise.
That said, have fun, and I'll see you soon for the next bit, whatever that may be!
- Beverly
