two-metre-wide, delta-shaped wings strapped to their backs seize the air, wrench them to a horizontal position and catapult them across the sky at 180 kilometres an hour.
They slice across the upper atmosphere, as high as a commercial jetliner on a transatlantic flight, like a cloud of giant bats on their way to a night feeding. The wings’ matte-black colour make them invisible against the night sky while their size and carbon-fibre construction make them invisible to radar detection.
What was the sales pitch? Red Bull gives you wings. Years before, on CNN News, Henri watched the Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner, festooned with Red Bull sponsor logos, jump out of an aircraft then fly across the British Channel with one of these delta wings strapped to his back. It was a revelation. The Frenchman stole Felix’s wing idea then spent $300 000 improving it. He needed to go further than the 35 kilometres Felix flew that day, so he redesigned the wing and tested it over the following two years to increase its lift-to-drag ratio. All for tonight.
Henri’s wing hits an air pocket and shudders. The Frenchman looks down at his chest. The GPS unit shows five streams of information, constantly updated. Right now the most important is the large arrow that points in the direction he must travel. When he’s on course it glows green, when he’s off course, it glows red. It’s now red.
His arms are by his side. Each hand holds a handle that operates a hydraulic ram. The ram activates a flap on the corresponding wing’s trailing edge. Twist the handle left to lower the flap, twist it right to raise it. He works the handles and the wing banks right. He glances at the GPS reader and the arrow blinks green.
Two bat-men arc away to the left. Henri watches Tam and Gerald shrink into the distance, knows their duties lie along a different path to his tonight.
**
Big Bird can’t be late. Folded uncomfortably into the tiny cockpit of the Twin Otter, the six foot seven Robby Muller pulls the aircraft into a steep descent.
Robby, or Big Bird to friends and neighbours because of his predilection for yellow T-shirts, guns the twin Pratt & Whitney turboprops. The German needs to get this aircraft on the ground and swap it for something more practical asap. He can’t be late.
**
8
The silver astrovan trundles towards launch pad 39B. It is essentially a pimped-out RV with plenty of room for the five crew members of Atlantis, and the two White Room guys who accompany them in case they need anything. The crew members are easy to recognise, dressed in bright-orange flight suits. Judd, as one of the White Room guys, sports, unsurprisingly, a white jumpsuit.
Martie Burnett sits opposite Rhonda. As payload specialist, Martie is responsible for the transfer of supplies and materials from the shuttle’s cargo bay to the International Space Station using the Canadarm 2, the spacecraft’s $150 million robotic grappling hook. Judd always thought she’d fit right in with the regulars at the salon in Steel Magnolias, swapping down-home truisms and hard-earned love advice with Dolly Parton. The truth is that Martie has a PhD in astrophysics and an IQ of 157, some four points higher than Judd’s.
Judd forces himself to stare at the van’s dark-grey carpet so he doesn’t look at Rhonda. He’d prefer to stare out the window but he can’t because there isn’t one. That’s to give the astronauts privacy and to make sure that if some loon took a pot shot at the van they’d hit bullet-proof Kevlar instead of glass. Given NASA is the perfect canvas for a terrorist organisation or lone gunman to scrawl a statement, it’s always a possibility.
On launch day, with the world’s media in attendance, the astrovan will be escorted to the pad by Kennedy’s own private army, the KSC SWAT team in their black, box-shaped van, while a brace of Jet Rangers swirl and chunter overhead,
They slice across the upper atmosphere, as high as a commercial jetliner on a transatlantic flight, like a cloud of giant bats on their way to a night feeding. The wings’ matte-black colour make them invisible against the night sky while their size and carbon-fibre construction make them invisible to radar detection.
What was the sales pitch? Red Bull gives you wings. Years before, on CNN News, Henri watched the Austrian daredevil Felix Baumgartner, festooned with Red Bull sponsor logos, jump out of an aircraft then fly across the British Channel with one of these delta wings strapped to his back. It was a revelation. The Frenchman stole Felix’s wing idea then spent $300 000 improving it. He needed to go further than the 35 kilometres Felix flew that day, so he redesigned the wing and tested it over the following two years to increase its lift-to-drag ratio. All for tonight.
Henri’s wing hits an air pocket and shudders. The Frenchman looks down at his chest. The GPS unit shows five streams of information, constantly updated. Right now the most important is the large arrow that points in the direction he must travel. When he’s on course it glows green, when he’s off course, it glows red. It’s now red.
His arms are by his side. Each hand holds a handle that operates a hydraulic ram. The ram activates a flap on the corresponding wing’s trailing edge. Twist the handle left to lower the flap, twist it right to raise it. He works the handles and the wing banks right. He glances at the GPS reader and the arrow blinks green.
Two bat-men arc away to the left. Henri watches Tam and Gerald shrink into the distance, knows their duties lie along a different path to his tonight.
**
Big Bird can’t be late. Folded uncomfortably into the tiny cockpit of the Twin Otter, the six foot seven Robby Muller pulls the aircraft into a steep descent.
Robby, or Big Bird to friends and neighbours because of his predilection for yellow T-shirts, guns the twin Pratt & Whitney turboprops. The German needs to get this aircraft on the ground and swap it for something more practical asap. He can’t be late.
**
8
The silver astrovan trundles towards launch pad 39B. It is essentially a pimped-out RV with plenty of room for the five crew members of Atlantis, and the two White Room guys who accompany them in case they need anything. The crew members are easy to recognise, dressed in bright-orange flight suits. Judd, as one of the White Room guys, sports, unsurprisingly, a white jumpsuit.
Martie Burnett sits opposite Rhonda. As payload specialist, Martie is responsible for the transfer of supplies and materials from the shuttle’s cargo bay to the International Space Station using the Canadarm 2, the spacecraft’s $150 million robotic grappling hook. Judd always thought she’d fit right in with the regulars at the salon in Steel Magnolias, swapping down-home truisms and hard-earned love advice with Dolly Parton. The truth is that Martie has a PhD in astrophysics and an IQ of 157, some four points higher than Judd’s.
Judd forces himself to stare at the van’s dark-grey carpet so he doesn’t look at Rhonda. He’d prefer to stare out the window but he can’t because there isn’t one. That’s to give the astronauts privacy and to make sure that if some loon took a pot shot at the van they’d hit bullet-proof Kevlar instead of glass. Given NASA is the perfect canvas for a terrorist organisation or lone gunman to scrawl a statement, it’s always a possibility.
On launch day, with the world’s media in attendance, the astrovan will be escorted to the pad by Kennedy’s own private army, the KSC SWAT team in their black, box-shaped van, while a brace of Jet Rangers swirl and chunter overhead,
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