Archive for May, 2009

On Monday, May 11, the Atlantis Space Shuttle blasted off on the last mission to the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) with a crew of seven astronauts who will install a new science computer to replace one that failed in September after 19 years, as well as a telemetry module and the Wide Field Camera III, among a number of other tasks. These three essential items to the continued productivity of the HST were designed and built by Dr. Edward Cheung, an electrical engineer specializing in robotics, and Principle Engineer of the HST Service Project; a native son of Aruba.

Dr. Cheung is has been sharing his eye witness accounts of the mission and its progress on a daily basis with reporter Rosalie Klein, family and friends, and he has kindly agreed to allow his accounts to be placed on Aruba.com. Readers will find they best inform as to the actual events, as well as providing his touching emotional involvement in being a part of seeing history made and opening areas of the universe never seen before to scientific observation.

Prior to launching, Dr. Cheung wrote:

“It has been several months since my previous launch update in October 2008, and a lot has happened since then. About two weeks before our previous launch, we had a malfunction on Hubble in space.  The central science instrument computer failed.  Without this unit, we would be unable to do any science observations.  The original unit had been operating flawlessly for 18 years since the release of Hubble.  We switched over to the backup unit, but conversations started immediately on what to do about this problem.  The NASA Administrator decided that it was not acceptable to leave Hubble without a backup, and the mission was put on hold.  This decision stunned many at the time (including the astronauts that would fly, and myself), but it has proven to be the absolutely correct response now that we can look back on it.”

“This will be our final visit to Hubble, and my final Shuttle mission.  As I have been visiting these facilities here for the final time these past few days, I do so with a sense of bittersweet happiness.  It has been a great privilege to be part of this team, and to have access to these facilities, and my team members and I have enjoyed our work.  Many of us cannot help but feel that this will be the highpoint of our careers and our personal experiences.”

Regarding Monday’s launch:

“It has been 7 years since I saw a Shuttle launch, and it is just amazing! We (his wife Agnes and two children, plus guests) had a good view from the Causeway, and we were looking straight down the tail of the Orbiter.  We could see the entire stack, including the MLP, and the flame trench.

Upon ignition, you only see the big white cloud of exhaust, but slowly the Shuttle rises above it.  Then, the exhaust flames come into view as a super BRIGHT flash.  The crowd erupts with this reveal with spontaneous emotion and cheering.  The Shuttle continues to climb silently and steadily with a bright red rooster tail.”

“Once the Shuttle is about 40 degrees in elevation, the sound finally hits you.  It is like a raucous rattle that shakes your body.  From 6 miles away, you can sense its POWER.  The main engines and the solids shall not be denied. Unexpectedly, I shed major tears.  I will never see my WFC3 instrument again.  I feel like a parent sending his child into the world to do its intended thing, never to see it again.  I worked on this instrument for 8 years.  I know every connector, cable, box, pin and wire tie.”

“My last Shuttle mission; and I shall miss KSC, the Shuttle, and everything about it. Now it is time to go to Houston, and set to work on Hubble”

The work will soon begin as astronauts lead by Commander Scott Altman approach HST. Aruba.com will continue to provide daily eyewitness updates from Dr. Cheung as the astronauts complete their twelve-day mission. 

Story by Rosalie Klein

As Space Shuttle Atlantis makes its way to the Hubble Space Telescope, Dr. Ed Cheung of Aruba traveled to Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, to head the team that will supervise the astronauts as they complete their assignment installing new and replacement equipment at the observatory. The astronauts go through months of simulation before the launch to become proficient at handling the intricate tasks required. Dr. Cheung and his team will be in constant contact with the astronauts as they work; ready to evaluate and advise them as to what to do when things do not go exactly according to plan. This is something technicians always take into account once the actual job is attempted in outer space, no matter how much testing and practice was done on the ground.

On the morning of May 13, Dr. Cheung writes:

“The Shuttle has not arrived near Hubble yet, so it is quiet in our control center.  There are three Flight Control Rooms here, and this is where NASA personnel monitor the mission from the ground.  These three are named after their color: Red, White and Blue.  The Hubble team is assigned the Blue Flight Control Room (BFCR).  The Shuttle is controlled from the White room, which is the one you see on TV all the time.  The Red room is used only for emergencies.”

“We work at our consoles, and monitor screens for data and listen on headsets.  The Shuttle data is on the built-in consoles, and we have been trained how to use those in previous training simulations.  The Hubble data is on separate smaller desktops and our laptops.  We are used to seeing those from back home.  We also have really big screens in front to see the big map (tracking where Hubble, the Shuttle, and comm satellite footprints, day/night line are) and also another screen that changes depending on what we are doing.”

“We listen to voice channels called ‘loops’.  Usually, we monitor several loops at once; although anyone may listen to any loop, who is allowed to speak on each one follows a strict protocol.  For example, the top person in command of the entire mission is the Flight Director.  This position was made famous during Apollo 13 by Gene Kranz (whom I met him a few years ago).  The Flight Director (abbreviated “Flight”) has his own loop, and only the top level people speak on that one.  Monitoring this loop allows you to know what is going on at the highest level.  One of the persons on this loop is “Payload”.  He/she represents the hardware being flown that mission.  Payload has a loop of his own where his subordinates use to communicate with him.  One of the persons allowed to talk on this loop is “Servicing Mission Manager”.  This person is the top Hubble person in the hierarchy.  I am part of “Systems”, and I use a fourth level loop to communicate with my subordinates.”

“To start a conversation, a person says three words.  The first word is the party they want to reach.  The second word is who they are themselves, and the third is the name of the loop they want to use.  Of course, they do this on a loop that the intended person is expected to monitor.  This way, a person can listen to several conversations at once, and just follow them lightly.  If they hear their call sign mentioned, they can find out who is looking for them, and which loop to “punch up” to respond.  All these simultaneous conversations are controlled from the panel with the yellow display in the image.  It sounds complicated, but with training, you can do it smoothly. We install WFC3 on the next shift after mine; that should be very exciting.”

Dr. Cheung reports he will be happy to answer personal inquiries regarding the HST by sending an e-mail to ed@edcheung.com. Official information and updates on the mission can be seen at the Hubble site: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/servicing/SM4/multimedia/index.html. 

Story by Rosalie Klein

The launching of Space Shuttle Atlantis on Monday, May 11, has again brought to the forefront of island an individual that is a great source of pride for the people of Aruba; Dr. Edward Cheung, Principle Engineer of the Hubble Space Telescope Service Project. His work has been vital over the years in keeping the telescope operative and innovative, designing and implementing, along with his team, equipment that solved various problems, some impossible to anticipate, which cropped up once the space observatory was placed in orbit. On a number of occasions they managed to save the beleaguered project.

Dr. Chueng was raised in San Nicolas, spending most of his time, he admits, around his grandfather’s small establishment, The Fontein Rum Shop. His grandfather came from Hong Kong to Aruba to work in the Lago Refinery, and his grandmother followed soon after Ed’s father, Kong Ming, to escape the Second World War. Ed’s father eventually opened his own grocery store, the Kong Ming Market, which would pay for Ed’s education at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute where he did his undergraduate studies.

From WPI, Ed went to acquire his Masters and PhD in Electrical Engineering from Yale University. His specialty was robotics, always with an eye to working in the space program. He earned his PhD with a scholarship provided by Philips Labs and NASA. In 1990 his doctorate dissertation was witnessed by a recruiter from NASA, resulting in a summer job at Kennedy Space Center, and his future was set. Though offered positions at the Kennedy and Johnson Space Centers, Ed chose to work at Goddard in Maryland, as this offered him the best chance “to put something into space. Eventually, this “something” turned out to be very historic for the island of Aruba.

When problems cropped up with a vital part of the HST that affected its cooling system, a solution needed to be found immediately. Something that would have normally taken months was produced in a few short weeks, and Dr. Cheung and his team devised the ARUBA box, or ASCS/NCS Relay Unit Breaker Assembly, which was attached to the HST in the spring of 2002, during the last successful mission of the ill-fated Columbia Space Shuttle. Dr. Cheung confesses that he devised the acronym to excite and stimulate interest in space and engineering amongst young students back on his home island. All Arubans watched with great emotion as the ARUBA Box mission was telecast worldwide.

Since then, Dr. Cheung has continued to make great contributions to the Hubble project, along with other innovations in computer and robotic science. He has garnered a number of accolades for his designs and inventions, including the Internet Pic 2000 Award, honors from publications such Nuts and Volts, Express PCB and Home Automater, plus the Ichabod Washburn Award from his Alma Mater, Worcester Polytechnic. It was a proud moment for Dr. Cheung when Astronaut John Grunsfeld pinned a Silver Snoopy Award on him for his contributions to the HST project, which he claims he never could have earned without the excellent work and cooperation of his team. Dr. Cheung was profiled in the 2007 edition of the Hubble Telescope Science Year in Review.

Dr. Cheung spent five years with NASA before joining the Hubble team, and it took time to ascend to his present position of Principle Engineer. In 2006 he received his fifteen-year award from NASA, and his responsibility has been the design and implementation hardware that keeps the telescope in orbit. It is his job to analyze and correct any anomalies. For years he was dedicated to perfecting the Wide Field Camera III, which will be installed on to the telescope during this current mission, along with a telemetry module he designed and a new science computer to replaced one that failed in September, delaying the mission, which was originally scheduled for October.

Dr. Cheung has generously shared his eyewitness accounts of the present mission, up to the launch and including daily updates on the progress. He provides fascinating information of the actual process, along with his own feelings of pride at being involved in making U.S. history, and hopes he will inspire others from his native island, particularly the youth, to strive to be the best they can be and always keep reaching for the stars!

Story by Rosalie Klein

Novelteas Promotion Offers Fresh Twist on Iced Tea

Hyatt Regency Aruba is getting into the swing of things this summer with the Novelteas promotion featuring a variety of fresh brewed Iced Teas shaken tableside with fresh fruits and juices.
Available at Palms Restaurant guests can choose from several Iced Teas shaken tableside including:

• Chamomile with Mango and Orange
• Pear and Lime
• Vanilla with Ginger and Lemon
• Peach and Pomegranate

“We are using only the freshest ingredients to put Hyatt’s spin on this classic summertime drink,” said Drew Carnahan, Director of Food and Beverage. “Prepared tableside and poured into a chilled glass, these hand crafted beverages will really satisfy this season’s most parched palate.”
For additional information, please contact Amy Ras, Hyatt Regency Aruba at (297) 523-4539 or amy.ras@hyatt.com.

A letter addressed to David Brown, Managing Director, Tierra del Sol Real Estate N.V., told a dramatic story.
Yesterday morning at 6:30 a.m. a Leatherback Sea Turtle of about 800 pounds, was found lost in between Tierra del Sol and the sea at the northern part of the island. After egg-laying the exhausted female Leatherback went in the wrong direction inland, and ended up near the Tierra del Sol Golf Course.
It was a big problem, reports Edith van der Wal, Turtugaruba, president, but the hardworking and dedicated staff of the golf course came to the rescue, fast and efficiently.

Elisio Guerrero, José Rodríguez, Marco Baez and Rukiman, helped the volunteers of Turtugaruba with a fork lift truck and pallet/sheet and with some additional assistance from the fire brigade, they succeeded to lift the Leatherback up, transport it and bring it back to the shoreline, where it crawled into the sea, well and alive.
Turtugaruba is forever grateful for the terrific save, and thanked the maintenance crew, for all they have done.

Mother earth, loves you too!!
Pictured here, the save and rescue operation on the golf course.