Today is the first official day of ESA's 45th Parabolic Flight Campaign. The team has breakfast at 6:45h and leaves for the airport before sunrise. What was yesterday a 30 minute trip is today a 75 minute one. Traffic is often stopped. The weather is colder and there is a light drizzle today. By the time we reach Novespace, most of the other teams have already arrived and the workshop is crowded and noisy. Today we received name badges, printed with our experiment number. We are experiment 1 and we will be placed at the front of the aircraft next to the main loading door. Since boarding of the experiments will happen in the afternoon, we begin immediately with the wiring and padding of the support rack. On the experiment rack, we start by performing a final heating test.

The "economy class" workshop at Novespace.

The support rack is ready.

Padding the support rack.

At noon we head to lunch in the nearby Restaurant Sogerma, which services all of the aerospace companies based at the airport. It is a short walk away. Unfortunately, the weather has not improved since the morning. In fact, the rain and wind has picked up a little, and our workspace next to the main door seems a little less ideal even though it was chosen because it will be necessary to unload our experiment several times during the campaign--a procedure that is not often allowed, but was accomodated in order to prevent bringing liquid nitrogen onto the aircraft. After lunch we are the first experiment to be boarded.

The experiment is ready to be transferred.

Lifting the supply rack.

The plane and our second rack.

It is our first time on the plane for this campaign, and the first time for many team members. We start exploring the plane, and capture some images of the cockpit and the Novespace building from inside the plane. This is absolutely forbidden by the flight and safety crews, but we didn't know that at the time and they were distracted while loading our experiment! So the pictures below are coveted ones.

Inside the cockpit with space for 4 pilots!

Novespace building from the plane.

Our support rack placed in the aircraft.

During the loading we notice that our racks need to be shifted towards the back of the plane a little in order to give our third flyer some space on the front side of the experiment rack. All experients behind us are adjusted accordingly. We also try out the space between the racks, which are allocated for two flyers.

Between the experiment and the supply racks.

In the afternoon we hook up our electronics control box and start to test the firing mechanisms. One piston sticks and we blow a fuse in the box. We spend the rest of the day realigning and greasing the pistons so that they do not catch again. We take the piston box home with us after Novespace closes so that we can replace the fuse and some transistors.

Repairing the piston electronics box after dinner.