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  • Tools do not carry responsibility
    Tools do not carry responsibility
    The tools will not remember Challenger. That obligation remains ours.
  • Progress without amnesia
    Progress without amnesia
    Remembering Challenger is not an argument against progress.
  • The hardest words to say
    The hardest words to say
    Courage in engineering rarely looks heroic.
  • Remembrance is a discipline
    Remembrance is a discipline
    Remembrance is a deliberate act, performed regularly, to prevent the slow drift toward normalization.
  • Forty years is not distance
    Forty years is not distance
    Time does not soften truth. It tests whether we are still willing to look at it directly.
  • Forty Years On
    Forty Years On
    Some events are not meant to be recalled once a year and set aside.
  • 50 Years
    50 Years
    The Artemis I mission occurred 50 years after Apollo 17. What will it take to not have this happen again?
  • 13 Minutes – a podcast review
    13 Minutes – a podcast review
    “13 Minutes to the Moon” – an excellent BBC podcast focusing on the behind-the-scenes heroes of Apollo 11 and Apollo 13.
  • Countdown
    Countdown
    It’s been 40 years since the launch of STS-1, and the excitement of that day never faded.

The links below cover a range of topics, from specific information on “What is a FDO?” to some information on life and operations in the MCC to various essays and tributes…

Contact me!

Flight Dynamics Officer

What is a FDO?
– Ascent
– Orbit
– Entry

My last day on console

My last FDO Log Book entries

Reflections on my career

STS-76: Letters from the Lead FDO

Mission Control Center

Mission Control Center Overview

What is the FDO looking at?

“The Flight Controller’s Creed”

Logos in Mission Control

Mission Control – 50 years

Atomic Fireballs in the MCC

Space Shuttle landing sites

Tributes

Words on a Chalkboard

Remembrance

“We Came Here, You and I…”

“Icarus Rising”

“High Flight”

Essays

Remembering Discovery

The Cathedral of Manned Spaceflight

“The Big Picture” (by John Young)

“Why have a space program?” (by Jim Lovell)

“30 years on: Lessons from Challenger”

“Challenger: Correcting some misconceptions…”

Space exploration is ‘destiny’

Mir Space Station website interview

STS-109 Entry photos

Space- and NASA-related blog entries

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