Lunanauts

Astronaut Reid Wiseman, Volunteer Tour Guide Brian Fies, and Astronaut Victor Glover. One of these things is not like the other. I actually had a few moments for a brief but nice conversation with Wiseman. Cool dude. Photo by my daughter Robin.

A while ago, my daughter Laura told me that Artemis 2 astronaut Victor Glover was scheduled to speak at a private after-hours event aboard her museum ship, the USS Hornet. "Oh, that's nice," I thought. A while later she said, "I think the entire Artemis crew will be there, and you should be too." "I wish I could," I replied in the imaginary conversation I made up for this post, "but I couldn't crash a private event." "You could if you were Hornet staff working it,” she replied. 

So Friday night I volunteered to give tours of the Hornet's Mobile Quarantine Facility (MQF), which was an Airstream trailer modified to quarantine the crews of early Moonlanding missions after their returns to Earth, a subject I actually know a bit about. The Hornet has Apollo 14's MQF. It isn't normally open to the public and we hoped to lure an astronaut inside. Alas, we did not. However, I did have the honor of giving a tour to NASA Lead Flight Director Zeb Scoville, who seemed to appreciate it. 

Welcome to the MQF! Want to tour my custom 1969 Airstream?

A shot of me giving a tour through the window of the MQF. On the Apollo 11 mission, that's the same window through which President Richard Nixon spoke with Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins.

The private event was a "Roll Call," a traditional fighter pilot occasion to reunite, swap stories, give toasts and, in this case, celebrate Glover's recent retirement. Fellow Artemis crewmembers Reid Wiseman and Christina Koch were there; Canadian Jeremy Hansen planned to come but couldn't. All spoke but, given that the event was private, I won't quote them. They're all smart, funny and inspirational. Of course.

It was an extraordinary gathering of extraordinary people, three of whom just flew around the Moon, and I was thrilled to be a fly on the wall. Happy to volunteer anytime! 

Kock, Glover and Wiseman celebrating Glover's career. It was a big night for him. His mother, wife and daughters were all there to witness it.