equal though he's constantly training to do his piece of work Master Sgt.

equal though he's constantly training to do his piece of work Master Sgt. Doug Huttenlocker dreads the day he'll have to use his skills.

That's because as a space shuttle deliverance manager, it's his job to coordinate deliver efforts if the shuttle has a enigma during launch. Huttlenlocker's tasked to chronicle a "hot zone," extract ship's company members and get them to a decontamination area.

"It's challenging to continue up the high intensity with something that has at no time happened and may never happen," he said.

He's single in kind of two firefighters assigned to the Department of Defense manned space flight support office. For about half the year, Huttenlocker travels to geographically separated sites across the globe to prepare folk at the sites for the possibility of a shuttle landing in their backyards. They formulate and train each base -- more than 2000 DOD clan worldwide -- in shuttle landing conducts all the way down to a basic rescue

"We train everybody from the on-scene commander to the hands-on rescueman," he said.

Huttenlocker knows the ascent is the mostly critical phase of a shuttle mission because everything is working together, which means that's when there's the greatest chance something could go on foot wrong. He said the highest probability of something going inapposite is if the shuttle let slips an engine during launch. If the booster -- which bake for roughly two and a half minutes -- don't obtain the vessel to 17,500 mph before falling distant from the shuttle can't get into space. If that happens, the shuttle has to "abort one time around" and return to united of the designated locations. Statistically, united in 100 launches might originate in a transoceanic abort landing.

on a level one is too many. for a like reason twice a year -- in March and October -- the firefighters guidance hands-on rescue training on mock-up of the shuttle and the orbiter. From a launch abort site landing to a full-up bailout exercise where the bulk of mankind are literally dumped into the ocean in astronaut suits, all players are involved. It's as stop to a real emergency as you can get

"Seven astronauts are sitting forward 2.2 million pounds of high explosives, 500000 gallons of liquid phlogiston and liquid oxygen, and they're going from naught to 17,500 mph in eight minutes," Huttenlocker said. "Every the same of them has seen the Challenger pat up. That's a lot to levy on the line for your rural parts and our world, so it's a small task for me to prepare family to rescue them, if it's perpetually needed."

Luckily, he's in no degree had to use his skills.

As a space shuttle contingency officer, Lt Col Frank Rand, said the highlight of his piece of work is watching a successful launch. As an eight-year-old, he sat forward the family living room floor watching Neil Armstrong's secondary planet landing on television. So when he arrived last year for his rife assignment, he had reason to apply the mind forward to his new piece of work -- a big change from flying C-9 and C-130s

Space lift

Although the manned space flight support team "belongs" to the Air Force administratively, the team's mission is supporting NASA. Nine civilians, six reservists and 22 active excise members -- including firefighters, aviators and medical and administrative race some wearing astronaut-blue jumpsuits -- are assigned to Patrick Air Force Base upon Florida's Atlantic coast to ransom astronauts, if the need arises.

In 1959 a year after NASA was established, the office was formed as a conduit between NASA and the DOD to support the manned space flight effort -- getting astronauts into and back from space. Since those early years, the mission has expanded to include the extricate and recovery of astronauts and payloads, providing landing site support, medical support, public affairs, contingency communication, airlift, sealift, salvage and orbiter ferry flights. From plot Mercury to present-day shuttles, the office has been the silent shuttle enabler.

if it were not that it takes more to perform the mission upon launch day, with NASA leading the way. While C-12 or C-21 aircraft perform on-scene weather reconnaissance, tankers, H-60 helicopters, Navy E-2 Hawkeye aircraft, ambulances and fire barters are deployed and stocked with flight doctors, pararescuemen, air traffic controller and firefighters. flat a Navy fast sealift ship in the area is dispatched to the Atlantic range as a floating command station if needed.

The brace primary shuttle landing sites are the Kennedy Space Center Fla., and Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. There are four additional sites available in Spain and Africa if there's a transoceanic abort landing: Moron and Zaragoza Air Bases, Spain, Ben Guerir in Morocco and Gambia's Yundum International Airport in Banjul. Three of the sites activate with each shuttle launch, and the support forces at these sites support DOD and NASA members. The other 25 difficulty landing sites are called forward as needed and rely in succession the site visits from Huttenlocker and his training teams.

"It's literally rocket science -- and orbital mechanics," Huttenlocker said.

Countdown begins

The proces starts drawn out before the countdown. Approximately 45 days before launch, the operations order, outlining the details of the plan, is created and sent without Thirty days prior, country clearances are begun for the overseas teams. Within common month of launch, status briefings prepare all members for what's ahead. The commander approves the plan and assigns participants around the 15- to 20-day point.