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

Exploring the Unknown 327
McDivitt
I thought it was.
[4-48]
White
I did too. I felt it was down far enough. I can tell by looking right straight down
at the edge--.
McDivitt
Yes. I can tell by looking up underneath the right-hand side to see where the dogs
are.
White
Okay. So I thought the hatch was down far enough to close at that time. I reached
up and got the handle, but I don’t know what I said to you.
McDivitt
You didn’t say anything. I don’t know whether you said anything to me or not, but
you didn’t have to say anything to me. I saw you move that handle, and I saw how
easy it was going, and I saw that the dogs weren’t moving.
White
I think I said something. I don’t remember what I said. But I said something, and
you knew right away what had happened.
McDivitt
You didn’t say a word. I was watching the dogs and that lever, and I knew what the
trouble was.
White
Right. So I guess that’s when I said, “I’m going to have to take the visor off because
I can’t see.” And then we went back up and Jim said, “Well, we’re not going to
open the hatch again. Why don’t you throw the visor out.” I hesitated for a minute
to throw it out because I thought that we might have a problem.
McDivitt
Actually, we had a little more difficulty than we had expected. We fooled around
for a minute or 2 or maybe even 3 or 4 with the handle. It was pretty apparent
to us that we weren’t going to get the hatch closed with normal, straight-forward
techniques, and that we were going to have to start going to other things. While
we say that we came down and moved the handle once or twice, it was over about
a 3 or 4-minute period, at least.
White
The normal method of closing the hatch is for me to come down and wedge
myself down, hold onto the little canvas handle up there, and actually apply a
downward force on the hatch to help close it. Then with my right hand I use the
hatch handle to ratchet the hatch down. This is normally our technique to ratchet
the hatch down. This is normally our technique we would always use, and never in