Outside and inside views of our hangar before unpacking.

Pierre-Simon, Brian, Sarah, and my flight landed in Dallas Texas around noon CT.  We grabbed our two rental cars and hit the road for our two hour drive to the hotel in Palestine.  After a brief stop on the hotel and a little lunch, we all rushed to meet John at  the NASA balloon base, CSBF (Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility).  We all received official NASA key cards (we’re cool like that) and got ready to unpack the truck that was expected to arrive at the facility around 3:30 pm.  It arrived a little after 5 pm.

Fortunately for us, the guys from the rigging crew lent us a hand with the unloading process.  They brought along two fork lifts as well, which was a major help.  The truck that took us 6 hours to load took us only 30 minutes to unload thanks to their help.

At this point in the day, the whole AESOP-Lite team in Palestine was exhausted.  We had all been up since 3 am at the latest because of our 6 am flight that morning.  We left the hangar a mess with crates and pallets everywhere.  Sleep took priority, but don’t worry, John Clem studied at the leadership school of Bill Belichick. In other words, no days off.

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-Matt Collins