"As always, we prepare for all sorts of contingencies. And the first few days of the flight up until docking on Day 3 are all spent really in the rendezvous because we launch at a time that puts us in an optimal position to catch up to station"
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The glamour people project onto spaceflight gets punctured here, in the most revealing way: by logistics. Linda M. Godwin’s sentence is almost aggressively procedural, and that’s the point. Astronauts don’t narrate heroism; they narrate systems. “As always” quietly normalizes the extraordinary, turning a once-unthinkable act into repeatable work. That phrasing carries a cultural message NASA has long depended on: space is safest when it feels boring.
Godwin’s real emphasis isn’t launch, the cinematic beat, but the anticlimax after it: “the first few days ... are all spent really in the rendezvous.” In other words, the mission’s opening act is waiting, calculating, adjusting. The subtext is a rebuttal to disaster mythology. Yes, you prepare for “all sorts of contingencies,” but preparedness is not panic; it’s protocol, drilled into muscle memory. She’s signaling competence without swagger, which is its own kind of authority.
The most telling line is the one that sounds almost like commuting: launching “at a time that puts us in an optimal position to catch up to station.” “Catch up” is wonderfully plain, even a little domestic, shrinking orbital mechanics into an everyday verb. It reframes space not as a frontier but as an appointment you make with precision. Contextually, it reflects an era of routine shuttle-and-station operations: spaceflight as infrastructure, where success is measured less by spectacle than by the calm, relentless orchestration of time.
Godwin’s real emphasis isn’t launch, the cinematic beat, but the anticlimax after it: “the first few days ... are all spent really in the rendezvous.” In other words, the mission’s opening act is waiting, calculating, adjusting. The subtext is a rebuttal to disaster mythology. Yes, you prepare for “all sorts of contingencies,” but preparedness is not panic; it’s protocol, drilled into muscle memory. She’s signaling competence without swagger, which is its own kind of authority.
The most telling line is the one that sounds almost like commuting: launching “at a time that puts us in an optimal position to catch up to station.” “Catch up” is wonderfully plain, even a little domestic, shrinking orbital mechanics into an everyday verb. It reframes space not as a frontier but as an appointment you make with precision. Contextually, it reflects an era of routine shuttle-and-station operations: spaceflight as infrastructure, where success is measured less by spectacle than by the calm, relentless orchestration of time.
Quote Details
| Topic | Science |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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