well Gordon if you are reading this...
JPL Open House fills up fast
Photo Gallery: Jet Propulsion Laboratory Open House
This year you didn't miss much except extremely long lines and long wait times, It was as the french say "an ordeal." i knew i would be in for a long day when looking at the JPL website the recommendation was that people arrive early Sunday as they had to turn people away Saturday by early afternoon as the attendance was unprecedented. (Capacity was 20,000 or so and it's basically the size of a small community college ) The last couple of times i had gone (2009 and 2010 or thereabout)s after i got off the 210 freeway it was a 5 minute drive up Oak Grove onto the campus. This time it was an hour plus of stop and go traffic and it was soon obvious that i was not the only person to arrive early, i arrived at eight and thought i'd grab a quick breakfast but i spent the hour instead crawling along. after i got my parking space it was an 45 minute wait in line to get past security...in previous times it took a minute or two AND if you had a backpack or largish bag they would tell you to take it back to the car, you would not be able to get on the campus (They hand out free totebags) Security took forever it seemed because of all the bag checking and pat downs.
I made it a priority mainly to see the mission control center (where communications are done) and the Sterile room (assembly) as in my previous visits i didn't get a chance to see them , between my three trips i pretty much have seen the whole thing now including robotics and tooling (which actually was very interesting, an engineer like you would appreciate how they have to in many cases invent/build a tool for a particular instance. In the past wait times would be about 30-45 minutes. sunday it was 90 minutes and that was under a 90+degree sun...this was another thing that dismayed me, when i went in the past open house (early May and mid May) it was still quite cool due to the marine layer influence,this weekend it was as if summer never ended which isn't all that unusual for So Cal as September is usually our warmest month. Basically i saw only three exhibits because of all the waiting and i did leave early cause i sure as hell wasn't going to wait until the place closer and get caught in the exodus. The visitors center alone and the various films they show will eat up much of the day so most people go both days, and it draws people from Arizona and further. My favorite (which i didn't get to this time) was earth sciences and near Earth satellites and studies
Although always popular it was an underground popular, aware mainly to mostly locals and engineers and space flight enthusiasts so this "unprecedented" turnout caught a number of people by surprise and most people thought it had to do with the success of the movie" The Martian " which name dropped JPL in the movie and interestingly enough Facebook, as i heard over and over and over people mention it was the first time they heard of it and they read about it on FB. As if i needed another reason to despise FB. I can't hate on Matt Damon though i like him and he's working on a new Jason Bourne movie right now (007 move over....way over
)
My main interest is and always has been it's past though and for the first time i found someone who at least heard of the Suicide Squad. in the past whenever i asked i was met with looks of confusion on the earnest young faces of the JPL staff but this time i found a white beard and i found that my fetish was not unheard of as the fellow told me the VERY approximate location of the famous photo taken of the Suicide squad which i have posted before in a thread mentioning J. Parsons. Everyone has an ideal If i could go back in the past what event would i like to have been a close witness of, this would be mine.
That will likely be my next trip up there, a pilgrimage of sorts to the Arroyo Seco and as i said i am not alone as the JPL guy said that people are always going into the was, lining up the photo above with the surrounding terrain and trying to find ...and recreate...the iconic photo, although its probably been graded and altered by now as it is a dry wash and will probably be getting another workout this year during the El Nino.
As far as future visits, i know if you ever find yourself destined to come to this area you can arrange a tour BUT i think it has to be made 6 months in advance but i'm pretty sure you will get to see the meat and potatoes ( visitors center, mission control, assembly, tooling etc.) and now the photos:
feel free to correct me.
