Reservists train for Space Shuttle disaster

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Paul Flipse
  • 920th Rescue Wing Public Affairs
PATRICK AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  According to NASA, the term "Mode VIII" refers to the worst-case, survivable shuttle-launch scenario involving an open-water bailout. In short, the shuttle encountered a problem during liftoff and doesn't have the means to make it to a landing site, which means the crew must parachute from the disabled craft into the Atlantic Ocean. 

On May 31, the reservists of the 920th Rescue Wing, along with NASA, the Army, Coast Guard, Marines and Navy, participated in an exercise that simulated just such a scenario.
 
As part of its peacetime mission, the 920th provides NASA with rescue services every time the Space Shuttle lifts off from Kennedy Space Center (KSC). So the exercise was an opportunity to hone the art of locating and retrieving downed astronauts, then delivering them to a local medical facility.
 
At 4:30 a.m. on the day of the exercise, NASA's solid rocket booster recovery ship, the Freedom Star, and the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Shrike motored some 40 miles off the coast from Port Canaveral.

Once there, the astronauts were driven to their "drop zones" on the back of personal watercraft driven by 920th pararescuemen. The astronauts were placed in a "string," a line stretching six miles from end to end, simulating the random, linear spacing of a crew who parachuted from a falling shuttle.

Once the astronauts were in place, the simulation had begun. Monitors at the 45th Space Wing's Human Spaceflight Support office displayed a recording of an actual shuttle launch, beginning 30 minutes prior to liftoff. A few minutes after liftoff, the call came that all was not well with the shuttle, that the crew would be initiating an open-water bailout and that the 920th was needed to bring them home. The Mode VIII was on.

Looking for a person floating in the world's second-largest ocean is roughly like searching for a basketball in the Sahara Desert. Yet the 920th Rescue Wing's contract with NASA says they must locate all astronauts within three hours and deliver them to a hospital within six, according to Lt. Col. Tony "T.C." Cunha, chief of training for the 39th Rescue Squadron, home of the 920th's HC-130P/N Hercules long-range, search and rescue refueling aircraft.

Colonel Cunha was the "air boss" for the Mode VIII--the on-scene commander in charge of every participating search-and-rescue (SAR) asset. Affable and lively, the colonel explained through a broad smile how well the 920th has fared against NASA's tight time constraints.
 
"I've been doing this fifteen years, and the standard has been two hours to the hospital," he said.
 
Search-and-rescue (SAR) teams utilize several items and tactics to produce such impressive numbers. First, they have a good idea where the astronauts will land and position themselves accordingly. On launch days, you'll find a 920th HC-130 turning slow circles over the Atlantic about 175 nautical miles from KSC. By using the launch azimuth, or path, as a guide, SAR teams can potentially eliminate time en route to the astronauts.

"It's a good, wet-finger guess as to the place they'll need help," said Tech. Sgt. Robert Grande, airborne communications and electronics systems specialist for the 920th. During a SAR, Sergeant Grande oversees radio operations onboard an HC-130 and utilizes equipment that help take some of the guesswork out of locating people in need of rescue.
 
Once the call for help comes, the aircraft begins its search by assuming a SAR configuration.

According to Sergeant Grande, they'll drop to an altitude of 3,000 feet, set the aircraft's flaps out for low airspeed and post lookouts, or "scanners," at each window. Then they'll fly a sector search, painstakingly covering all the airspace in a given sector, overlapping the previous path on each pass--like mowing a lawn--until every bit is searched.

Even if the search takes all day, the astronauts are prepared for a wait. The survival suits they wear during takeoff and landing are designed to sustain a conscious person for 24 hours and an unconscious one for 6, according to Ketan Chhipwadia, part of the team that oversees the critical job of testing and designing those suits for NASA.
 
"Everyone understands how critical it is," he said. "We are the owners and leaders of spacecraft survival ... we need to be the best at what we do.

"We can't sleep at night unless we know we've done the right thing."
 
Part of the equipment his team provides is a survival radio called the AN/PRC-112. Typically, it takes a SAR crew 20 to 30 minutes to make radio contact with a downed astronaut. Once they make contact, the crew can find the astronaut by following the radio signal. However, during this particular Mode VIII exercise, NASA tested a new version of the radio--the 112G, which boasts substantial upgrades to the old model, including a GPS feature that allowed the SAR team to pinpoint an astronaut in record time.

"I found him in twenty seconds," said Sergeant Grande, who then used the GPS identifier emitting from the astronauts radio to mark the exact point the astronaut was floating when they made contact.

While waiting for help to arrive, one astronaut reflected on just how isolated and exposed one can feel bobbing in the surf 40 miles from dry land.

"It's an eerie feeling," said Joe Acaba, one of the astronauts pulled from the water that day. "You're bobbing up and down and you're wondering what's bumping into you--a wave or a shark."

As each astronaut was located, the HC-130 crew passed the information to the units helicopters, HH-60G Pave Hawks, who then sped toward the relayed coordinates.
When the Pave Hawks arrived, the pararescuemen (also called PJs) leaped into action--literally, out the doors of the helicopters and into the sea, where they assessed the astronauts' conditions and helped hoist the orange-suited crew members to safety.

"Those PJs were very impressive," said Mr. Acaba, a biology specialist who once taught at Melbourne High School here. "It was seamless ... those guys were very smooth. It's a testament to the training and what they do every day. We're grateful to have them."

Colonel Cunha stressed the authenticity and depth of the training scenario and conditions of the exercise.

"Every piece of our combat capability is used in this exercise," he said. "The skills we employ during a Mode VIII are skills we use in combat ... the only difference is, we're not getting shot at."