spouse taxi

Tim got to taxi me and go down the runway at full speed but was not allowed to take off! It was alot of fun and we had a good time. I got to feel how uncomfortable it is to have all those straps/cords/connectors etc. strapped onto your body-especially the oxygen mask. A funny that happened is that Tim gave me his gloves after I was all strapped in I decided to fianally put them on. As I did, my camera fell. Mind you, I'm strapped in,he is strapped in, the prop is turning, the canopy is down and we were ready to go. So, I let Tim know I dropped the camera. He tells me how I can unstrap the opposite side harness to lean over to get it... I couldn't reach it. Then I took the other latch off so my upper body is able to lean over..still I cannot reach it. I tried and tried, so He had to shut down, open the canopy and ask the crew chief- a large guy- to see if he could get it. He leaned over and tried to fish it out. He finally got it..after being mortified.. we were able to do our taxi and I was able to get some pictures.(There is a pict of our crew chief and one to show you how tight the cockpit is-not much room for "fishing" if you drop something.)

We had to go through seat training(in case of fire and we had to be use the ejection seat). Another reason that it takes so long to get strapped into the seat, is your sitting on a huge rocket. And need to make sure everything is secure.