Falling Through the Atmosphere

It’s been a crazy last day!

Today we spent most of our time doing our Extended Duration Missions (EDMs). They were three hours long and TOTALLY insane. People were dying all over the place. The “space ghosts” (read: counselors who were there to give assistance when needed) could basically just pull us aside and tell us we were dead, or that we had contracted a disease and would die in a short time. The rules in terms of death were: there are no rules. I, personally, died one and a half times. Once from a cracked helmet, and two other close calls from CO2 and Asthma. The stakes were high, and describing the mission in detail would take about two whole blog posts.

We also launched our rockets! There’s not much to say about them really. Most of our Eggstronauts did not survive the flight, even though we put 3 and 1/2 hours of work into those rockets.

On a sad note, it’s our last night. It’s kind of weird, actually. We started Space Camp last Saturday and honestly, I think the group wasn’t feeling too thrilled about it.

Our feelings have completely changed.

I don’t know if our activities have gotten harder or we’ve just grown to like it more, but we love it now. More than that, we love the people we’re at the camp with — other Foxcroft girls as well as our new friends from China. I know we’ll be sad when we leave tomorrow.

But it’s not over yet! We still have graduation and our goodbyes to say.

I hope to update everyone on tomorrow’s final goings-on!

Avery ’13

Climbing to New Heights

Today we took our leap of faith.

We climbed to the top of a 25 foot pole, stood up, turned around, and jumped off. It was terrifying but incredibly rewarding, and everyone who did it looked thrilled, albeit a little breathless, when they were lowered to the ground.

We also did our four hour long missions today. We could either be in the orbiter, in mission control, or in the space station. Everyone really enjoyed every position and the missions as a whole. They were challenging and involved a lot of teamwork. During the missions, problems were liable to arise. In Space-talk, they’re called anomalies. Each anomaly required a different set of instructions to be solved, and the rush to find the right solution and finish it in the right amount of time was exciting.

Tomorrow we reach the pinnacle and complete our three-hour long missions. We’ve all picked our positions and hopefully they go well, although now there’s a new twist; the possibility of a medical anomaly and/or “death.” I’m really enjoying the fact that if we die on a mission, it’s our counselor’s prerogative to give us the task that brings us back to life. This could be anything from singing in front of the cafeteria audience to hopping on one leg. It ads adventure to the already insanely exciting adventure.

See you when we land!

Avery’13

Scuba and Zipping Along

The past two days have been incredibly busy.

Yesterday we built our model rockets, which we will launch on Friday. The rockets have to carry an egg safely to and from the ground, so we’ll see what happens in terms of that whole scenario.

More excitingly, both teams have now gone Scuba diving as well as ziplined! I haven’t heard any horror stories from either adventure, so I’m going to go ahead and say that they went very well. The zipline was pretty short, only about 70 feet long, but the snag was that we had to climb a fifty foot tower to get to the actual zipline, so it was kind of a two-part challenge. The scuba tank was fun, perhaps a little nerve-wracking in the beginning, but incredible just the same. The tank is 24-feet deep with a jungle gym-like structure inside, as well as a basketball hoops, bowling balls, and larger balls. We also built a tetrahedron underwater, which was a lot of fun. Our teams had a blast with both activities, and I know that the Foxcroft girls are making fast friends with the students from Shanghai in both groups.

Tomorrow we begin our actual missions. We’ll get to wear flight suits and “fly” a shuttle and do spacewalks. The challenge is daunting, but the reward will be thrilling. I’ll keep everyone updated with how those go tomorrow.

Avery ’13

Pictures!

Some of the girls having fun with their model rockets post-launch

The dorimtory

The Pathfinder model in the center of camp

A Replica of the International Space Station where we’ll be doing our missions

Avery ’13

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It’s been an exciting day!

Today we were all a bit more fresh than yesterday, seeing as we got a good night’s sleep. We woke up a bit sleepy but excited nonetheless. This morning we did more filler activities, like riding the rides and playing the army games again. While some people went on the G-Force ride it started to rain, so the rest of the group took shelter under an actual size model rocket. It was a true “only at Space Camp” moment.

We were the joined by the rest of our camp group, an American school from Shanghai. It’s an interesting mix of us as a result, as there are Americans going to school in China, a Chinese girl going to school in America, and just about everything in between. We watched a bit of the movie A Smile As Big As the Moon, a lifetime movie based on a disabled group of students who got to go to Space Camp.

Most memorably, today we got our first mission briefing. It was an interesting glimpse at what we’re aiming for with our time here. Tomorrow we scuba dive as well as learn more about our missions, so lots of very exciting activities coming up!

I’m hoping to put up pictures tomorrow morning, since I seem to be waking up a bit before our 6:30am call time.

All’s well,

Avery ’13

Greetings From “Space!”

Hello everyone! We’ve made it, after an exceedingly long morning in the airport, which drained us even more than a 5am wake-up already did. We landed in Huntsville after a relatively easy flight (for Foxcroft; I’m not so sure the other patrons realized what they were in for when they boarded a flight with 20 teenage girls). When we got on the bus to camp, we were told that in honor of our arrival at camp the International Space Station would be orbiting above us at 5:52 pm, which it did!

Today we settled into our boxy and, shall we say, cozy dorm rooms. It’s an interesting experience, being in rooms that feel like they belong to some sort of bad disney world ride (metal sheets on the roof and walls, PVC pipe guard rails on the beds, you get the picture.) But after we settled in we went to lunch, walked around the museum, went on a mars mission simulator and G-Force ride.

It’s been an exhausting day, but we’re all incredibly excited. We’ve already heard about some of the things we’ll be doing this week, which include running simulated missions and underwater training. I’m being forced into bed, but I’ll post pictures and more about our adventures tomorrow!

Avery ’13