Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Dr. Lee Morin, a former astraunaut, engages in a question and answer session with students at Beijing Space University Beijing, China

December 3, 2004

Posted on Dec 15, 2004

DR. MORIN: (Q&A already in progress)... The maximum G forces that the shuttle provides is the maximum of 3 G, which is relatively small. The maximum G forces that the human can (unintelligible)-- can stand, the record was done in a centrifuge -- in a very special centrifuge that was -- where the chamber was completely filled with water. And that was about 31 Gs. And this was a very dangerous demonstration done in the United States a number of years ago.

So 31 Gs is the maximum that a human has had. But that's not practical. The practical Gs that a human can take is approximately 8 to 10. A trained person would pass out somewhere around 5, 6 or 7 Gs. The first thing that happens is that you become blind temporarily, and then you lose consciousness.

But the shuttle is 3 Gs. The maximum is about 8 to 10, and the world's record special case was about 31. And finally, your question of how to train, the astronauts receive one training flight in a centrifuge that -- the centrifuge is an instrument with a little drum and a chair and it turns that gives artificial G forces.

And they provide the profile, which is -- profile G forces that you will receive in the shuttle, you get to experience it in this centrifuge one time. So that's a special training that's done in preparation.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible) to microgravity on the ground.

DR. MORIN: Yes.

QUESTION: And can you talk of how to produce the microgravity on the ground?

DR. MORIN: Yes. The question was about microgravity. Yeah, there's several functions here. The first is how to produce microgravity on the ground. And there are several ways of doing that. One way is with an airplane that will go to maybe 10,000 meters and then fall down maybe 3,000 meters. They can adjust the fall so that it just has a parabolic trajectory. And that airplane's used and that can provide about 25 seconds of microgravity.

It can also (unintelligible) at more shallow trajectories. It can give you a lunar gravity or a Mars gravity. So these are techniques that are used to take equipment and to see how the equipment will work in microgravity. And they're also produced to provide orientation to microgravity for astronauts. So that's one way.

Another way is to have a large tower and to evacuate the air from the tower and to drop it. In the United States there are several of those towers and that tower -- one of them is in Cleveland. It's about the size -- it's almost -- maybe almost 200 meters in size. And that allows it to drop. And they have drop times from 2.2 seconds to even as much as 5 seconds. And they have ultimately -- you know those packing noodles that you have for shipping? The little Styrofoam noodles? Well, if you have maybe ten meters of Styrofoam noodles so that the equipment that they drop which records the data that is destroyed when it gets to the end, it's slowed down with those noodles. So those are some of the techniques for doing microgravity on the earth.

Now, in terms of preparing for microgravity, there are about three methods that are used. One method is (unintelligible) in two dimensions where you float and you (unintelligible) and you work and that's one technique. Another technique that's been used is what's called an air-bearing floor. That's a very smooth steel floor that has surfaces that have compressed air. And these types of floors are often used in demonstrations in physics laboratories. You probably have such a floor at the university, an air-bearing floor. And this gives you a microgravity in two dimensions, what you can see when it's light if you move objects.

The third way, which is the primary way, is in a very large swimming pool. We have a swimming pool called the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory. It is a very, very large swimming pool. It has about almost 24 million liters of water in it. It is about almost 15 meters deep. And it has full-size models of the shuttle and full-size models of the space station. If you put on a suit, a suit very similar to the one that you saw in the pictures, only this is for the water, then you work. And on that you'd practice your tasks and practice the tool (unintelligible).

And there's one other way I need to mention that we use and that is virtual reality. We have an extensive use of virtual reality. Virtual reality

-- we have a model, a virtual-reality model of the space station and the shuttle that's over 750,000 polygons with very accurate texturing so that we'd have labels like the labels of (unintelligible) of this virtual reality are there. Every ribbon is there. And that one model is the master model for all the training devices at the whole center. So if they find a mistake anywhere in the models or any inconsistency, they'll fix it in one place and all the models are fixed.

You also have a version of that program, that virtual reality, that runs on your laptop so that you can navigate around to become very familiar with the space station geometry so that you know where a handrail is, or you know where a door is or you know where an area is that you need to keep out of. They call them keep-out zones. You don't want to be in a keep-out zone.

And so these are the four techniques that are used to prepare for microgravity in space. But ultimately, there's really nothing that -- each of those will represent one part of the experience. But nothing represents your own experience just one time.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible) as far as I know. Looking at an astronaut (unintelligible) I wonder (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: (Unintelligible) the question was, How do you manage to deal with daily life? It's basically, my opinion is I'm like everybody else. Another question?

QUESTION: All right. My question is what did you feel when you first went to space?

DR. MORIN: Thank you. My next question was what did I feel when I first went into space. When you first go into space you're lying on your back. And I flew up to space on the main deck, had some air-born lockers right in front of me. And there was a strap, like a sheet metal strap that went across that I could hold onto to adjust myself.

And before the launch you're strapped in and then you're there about three hours waiting for the launch. And the space shuttle has to launch to meet the space station. It has a very narrow launch window. A very narrow time. Only about five minutes. If it's early or if it's late from five minutes, it will not reach the space station. If you can't reach the space station, it's -- there's no point in going because you have to install that on the space station.

Now, you get a -- it's always a question whether you're going to go because there's so many systems and so many checks. And if there's any question, it will be later. And often it will be later. Some of the (unintelligible) was delayed 13 times. So you have to be psychologically prepared for the delay that might be there.

So you're waiting there and waiting there for three hours. And finally we're down on a countdown to the last few minutes. And all of a sudden we hear this on the control loops. It was some computer that I'd never heard of before in the control center that had to be rebooted. Now, many of you may have had the experience of rebooting a computer, but it doesn't always go very fast.

And finally the commander said, "How long is this going to take to reboot the computer?" And the engineer said, "A couple of minutes." And at that time we had 50 seconds left. And so psychologically I was ready to get out. We were done for the day, because you have to wait until the next day. And then all of a sudden about two seconds later, the computer's ready. The flip (unintelligible) that went around the room, it was, uh, Boosters go, (unintelligible) go, launchers go, you know, and each of the flip controllers said go. We're going for launch. And then they light the engines.

And the shuttle has liquid engines and also solid engines. But they lit the liquid engines and fired them for six seconds to make sure that they were good before they light the solids, because once you light the solids it's like lighting a match. You can't turn it off. And you're going someplace. And so once the engines light, the vehicle sways. It's like being on a tall tower or a tall building in the wind. They call that the "twang."

So you feel this twang and you hear the engines come up. And then they lit the solids and, Bam, it's like you're sitting in the traffic and a truck hits you in the back. And then you know that you're going someplace. And then you start to go and you're vibrating against it. Then you start to get heavy and your Gs build up. And this is after you get up to Mach 4, 4,000 feet per second. Your solid rockets fall off and you're about 50 kilometers altitude and about 200 kilometers down range. The solids fall off. And then the engines continue to burn and then you start to build up your velocity. That's (unintelligible) six and a half minutes.

At seven and a half minutes you feel like you were in the playground and the bully was sitting on your chest beating you up. And then all of a sudden it stops. And everything's still. And it's a feeling -- you know when you first get on the elevator, the elevator moves, you kind of get the "up" feeling in the elevator. You get that up feeling but it doesn't stop. It continues. And the dust from the floor comes up. The little things from the floor come up.

And you look down and a pencil that is on your knee board -- you have a little board on your knee to write notes -- the pencil is up floating like this. And you pull your seat belt -- you have a seat belt that is a fireproof seat belt and the straps float up like this. Now, my partner Jerry, who was sitting next to me, that was his seventh mission. He set the record for the most times a person went into space and the most -- and Jerry is the American with the most space flights.

He jumped up. He was out of his seat just like that and he pats me on the back and he says, "Welcome to space, rookie." And so then I come up out of the seat. And I'm not sure about this. And if you've ever -- the first time you walk on a sheet of ice, you kind of have that feeling, not so sure what's going to happen. That's what it's like, only in three dimensions. But that's what it was like to go into space.

QUESTION: Thank you. I have (unintelligible) question. (Unintelligible) and before we (unintelligible), what did you think of first? What did you first think of when you landed (unintelligible)?

DR. MORIN: State the last one again.

QUESTION: What (unintelligible)?

DR. MORIN: The training is very, very thorough. And the training prepares you for the things that might happen. And you've spent many years of your life to get ready for this mission. You've spent seven years in NASA. But actually, your whole education, as everything you did in your career even before NASA, all is preparation for that moment.

And I can honestly tell you that I did not experience the emotion of fear, maybe because I was too dumb. But I did not feel the emotion of fear because of the things I was doing. I was busy and I was working and doing things that are very familiar because of the training. And the key is to have training that prepares you for the situations. And then you just work the procedures.

And another thing that's very important is the teamwork. This is not something that -- to develop a space station is not something that you do by yourself. And the teamwork of building is very carefully done and there's many exercises and many training things and many psychological challenges that prepare you to work as a team. And even if you're faced with a very difficult situation, you are calm, you assess the situation, you use all of your resources available. You use all of the intelligence and all the people on the team and you apply that to the problem to give yourself the best chance.

But then I can give you one example of that training. As part of the training, we fly in a jet plane called the T-38. It's a small jet. It's used by the U.S. Air Force to train pilots. And NASA has about 30 of these jets and we fly in that jet several times every month to practice and prepare for space flight.

Now, NASA has different kinds of astronauts. And some of them are pilots, which are test pilots, and some are scientists and doctors like myself. The test pilots are the best pilots because that's considered the pinnacle of the career of a pilot and so they have the best applicants in the United States apply to be those test pilots. And they're very experienced pilots.

And they even have people like me who have relatively less experience in aviation. But what they train us is that that test pilot who is in command of that plane has a crew member in the back seat. And that crew member, even if that crew member is a beginner, can make that pilot stronger as a team. And some of the pilots have a little bit of adjustment when they first arrive.

One question is this doctor behind me in this seat, what's he going to do to help me? And they're trained. And you need to use that doctor, you need to train him. You need to tell him how to help you, because he's another pair or she's another pair of eyes, another mind, another hand. And that person can check you.

And the shuttle, it's not possible for one person to fly the shuttle. It needs a minimum of three to four people. And so you can't take a one-man team. You have to use the strengths of the other people around you. And that teamwork and that working with strengths with the other people around you in developing that is having to overcome challenges like fear that you mentioned.

QUESTION: Dr. Morin, is there (unintelligible)? My question is what did your astronauts do with this problem and how did you feel about (unintelligible) space (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: Yes. Thank you. Actually, in microgravity, even for a few days, you get taller. And I grew about five centimeters. And that can sometimes create a backache type problem. I didn't have a problem with the backache. For me, actually, all of those little aches and pains that you might have in the knee or an elbow -- all those pains went away. And space felt great.

But (unintelligible). When they fit the space suits, they have to allow extra room for that (unintelligible) change. But after you come back to earth, very quickly that goes away and you go back to your regular height. So it's not going to make me play basketball (unintelligible).

QUESTION: (Unintelligible). Also, one last question. Just (unintelligible) that you spent many years to become astronauts, do you have any training that (unintelligible) to space (unintelligible), because I want to ask the question because (unintelligible) one of the (unintelligible) in space. (Unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: Okay. The question was, How about the -- you know, with the risks of space and the training that I described, how is that compatible with space tourism. And the answer is that it is compatible, but it's important to realize that there are tremendous risks in going into space. And there's no question about that.

And there has been several space requests to go to fly to the space station. The (unintelligible) and that's by a Russian. And if you have $20 million extra in your pocket, you can go to Russia and they might be able to let you take a seat on to space for about one week. But they require that you go to Russia for one year of training. And so that's considerable training that's required for the space tourist from Russia. Without that much training, they don't believe that in space that it's safe.

Now, as we go forward, it will be possible to have space tourists with less training and that can be safely done, just as it was done in aviation and other fields. But let me just comment on the (unintelligible). That was a marvelous event with (unintelligible) and his backers to be able to -- without government sponsorship and private sponsorship, to be able to go to -- into space. But to realize that (unintelligible) is called a (unintelligible). This was similar to the first American flight of Alan Shepard on the Redstone. And since this is an aerospace university, let me just point out that to be in space, to be in orbit, you need to be going at 25 times the speed of sound.

If you're not going at that speed, you will come back to the earth. And that is just a fact. Now, the speeds that were obtained by the X Prize were about Mach 3, three times the speed of sound, which is a tremendous speed and it's an awesome achievement that they were able to do this. But that's what it was, three times the speed of sound.

And that allowed them to go up to a very high altitude. I think it was -- was it 127 kilometers? I forget the exact altitude but it was a high altitude. And the length of that mission was about 15 minutes. But you could not go to the space station on that or you could not go to the moon on that or you could not stay in space on that because you're on a trajectory that's going to bring you back to the earth. And you need a lot more energy to turn that very narrow ellipse, that orbit that they were on, and to expand that orbit out so that it would go around the earth. And the amount of energy that it would take is proportional to the square of the velocity.

And so they had about from Mach 3 to Mach 25, a factor of 8. So they needed 8 times more velocity to stay in orbit. And then the energy, they needed 64 times the energy. And so that's an engineering challenge (unintelligible) for this hallmark problem for the students here to solve the engineering challenge in providing a power system to provide that energy for it so that this small plane can stay in space. And then you can stay there. But for a 15-minute flight, which would really be a wonderful ride and I'm sure that they'll have some success with this space tourism, that can be done relatively safely with training and motivated, you know -- a safety person.

QUESTION: We're going to have a lot to do, then, starting (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: Yes. Thank you very much. And congratulations to all of you folks who are in the initial phases of Apollo training. It's a wonderful experience and really on the forefront of humanity. And it's the profession that allows us to be one day in China and the next day in the United States so we can come and give these neat talks and make friends. So aviation is really a critical thing. It's a -- congratulations to you for undertaking it.

In terms of your question about advice, I would say the advice that I could give you is to fly safe.

QUESTION: Okay. (Unintelligible). Just a quick question. You know, China has made some great achievements in the space program in the last couple of years. They sent a man into space last year. (Unintelligible) there is a feeling that America doesn't acknowledge the achievements that China has made. What is your feeling about China's space program and just about (unintelligible) for not (unintelligible) about achievements China has made in the last four years?

DR. MORIN: I would categorically reject any suggestion of prejudice. I would say that China's achievements in space are truly remarkable and are admired. And in the United States, we congratulate China and the Chinese space program and all of the scientists and engineers who have made this wonderful achievement possible. And China has joined the tiers of a very select group of nations at this point that actually has put -- has developed the technology and actually put a human in space and has an ongoing program that's unfolding that I understand has many important milestones that are planned for the future.

And I think that that's a terrific thing. And you heard me earlier speak about the importance of it. I view the space program as a fundamental development of humanity to come off of the planet. And I believe that that is an evolutionary -- at one view it's an evolutionary type of development and change comparable to the first creatures that came out of the sea on to the land.

You know, all of us are in a space suit. The skin of your body and the technology that is in your body is actually preserving the (unintelligible) of (unintelligible) things you can see. If you ask the doctors, they will tell you that the salts in your blood are exactly the same salts in the same proportions as they were -- as they are in the sea, except when the sea was a lot more dilute. And what has happened is that you have -- your body represents a space suit taking a drop of ocean out into the harsh environment of the land.

And now humanity, using the technologies in the last few years, is very rapidly developing the means of being life's agent to get life off the planet. And so China, joining that effort and developing technologies that extend that quest, I can only applaud.

QUESTION: Morning, Dr. Morin. What I want to know is that, what efforts do you take to turn yourself from a successful pilot to a politician? (Unintelligible) and how do you like your job now? Okay, thank you.

DR. MORIN: The question was how do I like my job. Let me give you a little story about this. One thing -- first let me say that my father worked for the U.S. State Department for 50 years and so this was an opportunity to see what his work was like, which I never expected to have happen. But one day -- and those of you, the pilots know, you come into the squadron and you get your briefing from the commander.

And the head of the Astronaut Office came into the morning meeting, Monday meeting, and he said, "We need a volunteer to go to the State -- to the State Department," you know, "to stop practicing flying spaceships and go to Washington and work with (unintelligible) and maybe you can do some travel. Do we have any volunteers?" And so I was very interested in that because of my father's background and it was an opportunity to see what he had done. And I went to embassies around the world when I was growing up. And the business in the embassy was -- and the business in the State Department administration in Washington -- were always very mysterious to me. I know the day I went down and did something and (unintelligible) talked to people and I met some of those people, but I'd never quite understood what he meant. And now I get a chance to see it firsthand. And so that's been very rewarding.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible). As we all know, (unintelligible) in space. What's your comments or your (unintelligible) experience? Is it (unintelligible) or is (unintelligible) or it's something which you use to (unintelligible) use the (unintelligible) to show how (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: You know, that's an interesting question. Obviously the opportunity to represent humanity with a space flight and to represent a country in the space flight, also, is a very great honor. And the experiences both in the training and the friendships of the people that made it possible to thousands of people, the engineers and scientists, like the people that are being trained in this lecture room, that make it possible for these things to happen has been very rewarding. And of course the pinnacle of that is the mission itself. And of course we have the memories of those missions and the excitement of the missions, and the symbology in what that mission represents is something that it's a great honor to be able to talk (unintelligible) and to share it with students like you. So yes, it's been all those things.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: The question was, what about the influence of science fiction on astronauts and on me. I think we saw that in the presentation. We looked at the theme of the science fiction and how those science fiction fantasies became realities. And in fact, the fiction is very important because the vision of the science fiction writer is very inspiring.

And that allows other people to learn that vision and assume that as space flight and learn to develop the technologies that make these missions possible.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: Yeah. Well, there's no question. That's a very profound question and thank you for that. And the question really is, you know, it's up to us. The question is do we have a peaceful world or a disastrous world? And the technology can do very wonderful things or it can do very terrible things. But I have a great deal of confidence and optimism. And I've had an opportunity to travel around the world and meet a lot of people.

And the technologies that -- you know, these are technologies -- for example, for communication like the Internet and the related technologies allow people to communicate and allow information to be places where it just couldn't be. When I was a college student I worked on a network. That network was called the ArboNET and that had 30 (unintelligible) on it.

That ArboNET became the Internet. There's more than 30 (unintelligible) now. And at that time the (unintelligible) were just a handful of leading universities. And now we have (unintelligible), and libraries and individuals around the world are able to communicate and share information.

And I believe that that's key to permit the humanity to find its way and do the right thing by having this communication and being able to find a path and (unintelligible) these dangers of disasters and get to a place where we -- the whole world has sustainable development, that the medical and human needs around the world are met, and that we can all work together to make and have a very bright future together. I'm confident that that's what we're going to do.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible). Thank you very much (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: (Unintelligible).

QUESTION: Because of your (unintelligible) career, you have much less time together with your family. And were there any problems between your family and your career, and how did you deal with those? Thank you.

DR. MORIN: Well, I have to be careful because my wife is right here so I can't -- but my wife has always been very supportive of what I've wanted to do. And I'd love to tell you a story. I think I can tell you this story. I won't get in too much trouble.

When you apply to be an astronaut, you have to send in college transcripts. The records from your university have to go to the -- part of the application. And it always seemed like such a very, you know -- so many thousands of applicants. They only take a few. But I always felt that if I didn't apply I'd always wish that I had applied. And so finally I applied. I sent in the application. And I sent in the thing to my university to send the transcript, to send the records to NASA. And the receipt came back from the university to the house that these records had been sent to NASA. And my wife found that letter. And she saw it and she said, "Did you apply to be an astronaut?" Because we hadn't fully discussed it at that point so -- but my family has been totally supportive and I would not have been able to be where I am at all without my wife Rose.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible).

QUESTION: I apologize for my (unintelligible) because I am so eager to ask you question. My question is about cooperation in space program between China and the USA. (Unintelligible) the 1980s the U.S. spaceship (unintelligible) the Russia spaceship, they used to meet in space. So now (unintelligible) space. So what do you think of the prospect that China spaceship (unintelligible) and American space (unintelligible) will meet together in space? That's (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: That is a very exciting concept and I know that the -- earlier this week, you may know, I had the opportunity to meet the director of the China National Space Agency. And originally I was scheduled to meet him today but we had to rearrange the schedule so I could see him much earlier in the week because he went to Washington, D.C. to speak with the NASA administrator. And so I know that they had a very good discussion. And so we'll have to see what possible future collaborations might be possible. But the right people are talking.

QUESTION: (Unintelligible).

QUESTION: (Unintelligible) they want to know what type of relation between the (unintelligible) space (unintelligible) study or the space (unintelligible) technology (unintelligible) from us.

DR. MORIN: Yes. Basically that question --

QUESTION: 'Cause if (unintelligible) model costs so much.

DR. MORIN: Yes.

QUESTION: So therefore a couple of people want to know what kind of (unintelligible) did you use (unintelligible) to fix that model till you (unintelligible).

DR. MORIN: Yes. The space programs are, as you said, very costly.

QUESTION: Yeah.

DR. MORIN: But they have also provided great benefits and those benefits are several. Just in terms of the specific aspect of your question, which was (unintelligible) biotechnology, space flight provides several benefits. One is that microgravity provides an environment where proteins and other vital molecules can crystallize so that you can get better X-ray images of them for better structural (unintelligible).

So this is one field of research that's been done quite a bit. But there's an infinite amount more to do in that. So that's a biotechnology application. That's one.

Another is space flight actually is a reversible model for aging because if you go into space, a number of things happen. You lose muscle, you have neurological changes, you have changes to bones which are like the osteoporosis or weakening bones that old people have. And in the United States that's an epidemic among older women. That's a very serious problem.

And there's also other changes that are very similar to a rapid aging process. But then when the person comes back to earth, that is -- can be largely reversed. So that reflects a basis for some more understanding of the aging process. And so those are some of the possible biomedical spin-offs or benefits from space flight. But those in and of themselves are not enough to justify the cost. You don't want to overlook that.

But fundamentally, this is a matter of exploration, which as President Bush said in his Space Exploration Vision last January is that exploration is the desire niched in the human heart. And so having the manned space flight is a fundamental of pride. And as I mentioned before, it allows humanity to be life's agent for extending our range.

And in terms of the -- some of the other commercial benefits, I'll just mention that I'm staying at a very nice hotel here in Beijing. And I looked out the window and just for fun I thought I would count the satellite dishes. And I stopped counting after 70 satellite dishes on the roofs of the buildings. Those dishes are not there for decoration. Those dishes are there because they are meeting important commercial and communication and business and governmental needs.

And space flight is very, very meshed with our modern society. And in many, many ways that you don't quite realize it. Timing information. And I had the opportunity to meet your Timing Center, your (unintelligible) earlier this week. The timing information, the communications information, the (unintelligible) mission information for earth resources to use for urban planning, for use for coastal management and many, many other things. The geographic information, GIS systems, which are becoming so important. All of these are aspects of space flight.

The main program is part of that. And you know, together all these programs will go forward and they'll have many, many benefits.

QUESTION: Okay. Thank you.