Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in ... - The Black Vault

Exploring the Unknown 303
White
Well, we talked and you said, “What do you think?” We talked it over and I had the
same feeling. I thought it sure would be smart if we had about 20 minutes to just
sit here real still before we went out.
McDivitt
I think we were in a situation where it would probably have gone all right. We had
completed about 80 percent of what we really should have had done as far as the
checking went, and I just didn’t feel that we were in the right shape. Ed didn’t
think we were, and besides, I could see Ed. He couldn’t see himself. Ed looked
awfully hot, and he looked like he was getting a little pooped out from playing
around with that big suit. I thought that the best thing for his sake, and I knew he
wouldn’t admit it, was to let him rest up for another orbit.
White
I agree that was the best judgment.
McDivitt
So, when we got to Carnarvon - I guess it was Carnarvon I called them and said we
were not going to come out on that orbit.
White
It was Carnarvon. It was just before we depressurized.
McDivitt
So, we postponed it until the next orbit. As a matter of fact, after that we just sat
there. We didn’t do a thing for about 10 minutes. I let Ed cool off a little bit. We
were on two-fan operation at the time. We just sat there and we were cooled off.
We went around for about 20 minutes then.
White
Okay. Then as we went back around, I asked you to go through the checklist
again, and we went through item by item this time.
McDivitt
That’s right. I might add that we went right back to the beginning checklist, the
Egress Preparation Checklist. We started at the top one, and we did every step on
it again. We verified every step to make sure we hadn’t left anything out.
White
We actually went in and checked this time. Another thing we hadn’t really positively
checked was the position of all the locks on all of the hose inlets and outlets. This
time we [4-24] actually checked all those locked. All of them were locked in, but
it was a good thing to do, I believe.
McDivitt
You want to make sure. We did do our Suit Integrity Check before we started all
this stuff.