Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!delta.eecs.nwu.edu!phil From: phil@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (William LeFebvre) Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle Subject: Re: Shuttle Crew Seats Message-ID: <1685@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 29 Nov 89 17:20:44 GMT References: <6781@pdn.paradyne.com> Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: phil@delta.eecs.nwu.edu (William LeFebvre) Organization: Northwestern U, Evanston IL, USA Lines: 27 In article <6781@pdn.paradyne.com> steve@goofy.paradyne.com (Steve Fowler) writes: >In article rb5d+@andrew.cmu.edu (Robert Bates) writes: >>From: yee@trident.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) : >>> KSC SHUTTLE STATUS REPORT - TUESDAY, NOV. 21, 1989 >>> STS-33 - (OV 103) - PAD 39-B - LAUNCH MINUS ONE DAY >>> crew seats will be installed in the flight and mid decks. >> >>Why do they wait until one day before launch to install seats? > >I would suspect that this is done to allow the pad crew easy movement >inside the vehicle. It is easy to move around while the vehicle is in >orbit, but... The seats for the commander and pilot are permanently mounted in the vehicle. But the mission and payload specialists sit in chairs that are not permanent (two on the flight deck and three on the middeck). Once the vehicle is on orbit, the chairs are removed and stowed Reinstalling the chairs is part of the deorbit preparations. This also explains why you only see two chairs in the video that they send down. I'm virtually positive that it is these chairs that the press release is referring to. William LeFebvre Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Northwestern University