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

Exploring the Unknown 325
White
After awhile, I reached my left arm underneath, the same technique we had used
in the zero-g training, and actually I had my hands all over the circuit breakers.
McDivitt
Yes. Ed was a real hazard to the switches.
White
Yes, and I pulled myself down in and that’s when I really started coming in – when
I got hold of the underneath side of the circuit breaker panel and pulled myself
in. That’s when my first real progress was made toward actually getting down in.
McDivitt
Because, while I could steer Ed from where I was, really didn’t have the strength
to pull him in.
McDivitt
It was 90 degrees to the way that he really wanted to be pulling. I could steer. I did
do a little bit of pushing, but not a heck of a lot. I wasn’t really contributing much
to the effort there except --.
White
You were guiding me down into the footwells.
McDivitt
Yes. That was about it.
White
But once I got my hands up underneath the instrument panel, I was back pretty
well in familiar grounds – the work that we’d done five dozen times in the zero-g
airplane, and I knew the technique pretty well.
McDivitt
Ten thousand times! White does check pretty well.
White
I really did it a lot. Maybe the suit was stiffer, or maybe I was fatter, but I wasn’t
going in quite as easy as I had before – getting into the initial position to pull
myself down into the seat. So it took me a little longer. If you recall, I had to go
back out again one time. I got back down and started to wedge myself down, and
I got two fat cramps at the bottom of my thighs in both legs, where the muscles
started to ball up a little.
[4-47]
McDivitt
Oh? Did you get in your thighs or calves?