Excursion to Rome to Recover a Spacecraft, July 2001

The ARTEMIS spacecraft was designed and constructed under the prime contractor management of Alenia Spazio and direction of the Italian Space Agency (ASI) as a research vehicle for the European Space Agency (ESA). Conduct of the launch and ascent mission is carried out by Telespazio from the control center at Fucino, Italy. On July 12 an Ariane 5 rocket launched the Artemis (Advanced Relay and Technology Mission) spacecraft and a co payload Japanese spacecraft BSAT-2B into earth orbit An under performance of the Ariane second stage at about 80% thrust and 20 second early shutdown placed the payloads in lower than intended orbits. These events led to a consulting assignment for the author to develop, review, and advise on a recovery scenario for the Artemis satellite, in Rome, Italy. The following are some off-duty observations made during that visit.

Saturday July 21, 01:

Well as the day/night goes on here I gotta say for once I'm doin it right. Did the night flying over the ocean where you can't see anything anyway. Flying over Europe and Switzerland in the daylight and the visibility is great. Especially over the green sunny hills and valleys of Switzerland - then over the Swiss and Italian Alps. There's a lot of snow, yet the peaks are below or just above the tree line, so everywhere there's not snow it's lush and green. The abundant snow in July must be due to the high latitude. Beautiful lakes by the dozen in the valleys.

The first few hours in a new place are always a little trying. A long flight without much sleep, don’t know the language, can’t get money, don’t know where anything is, culture is different from home, etc. But am adjusting fast to Rome. The whether is beautifully warm and relatively undestroyed by air-conditioning like Baltimore or Houston. Went off to find the sites early Sunday morning. Walked from my hotel, the d’Inghilterra (wonder if Hilton is somehow buried in that name),Via Bocca di Leone 14, to St. Peter’s Cathedral (St. Pietro) and the Vatican. My visit was cut a little bit short by my shorts – they wouldn’t let me in without long pants. Along the way I passed Piazza Mignanelli and its fountain, the ruins (in pretty good shape) of Piazza Augusto. Piazza Adriano, and Castel St. Angelo. One quickly gets impressed with the architecture and art around here. Hopefully later in the week I can get back with pants on and when the Sistine Chapel is open.

There seem to not be too many rules around here. People drive both cars and motorcycles about where and how they want, but seem to be in an equilibrium that works. They appear to get around efficiently without causing too much harm. By the way, the new stuff around here was built about 600 years ago. I’m amazed that they had the forethought to put these buildings just far enough apart so a car could go down the street between them. Buildings are crowed together in typical European fashion, but every few blocks there is a square left open as a plaza (piazza). It truly is the city of fountains, with a very elaborate fountain in nearly every plaza. Seems too like people readily walk up and drink from the flowing water of these huge fountains.

Leaving the Vaticano and walking South along the river I visited Palace Farnese, then Piazza Navona – spectacular huge fountains here – two of them, then Piazza Rotonda and the adjacent Pantheon. The Pantheon is a huge single chamber domed structure with a big circular hole in the top, and the alter of every religion arranged around the wall inside. From here to Piazza St. Marco and the Vittoriano, a very large and high marble structure at the south end of Via del Courso, perhaps the main N-S street of Roma, built to honor Italian soldiers past. I think this was built in the twentieth century – maybe the newest structure in Roma. By climbing to the top of the many steps of the Vittoriano, one can look south over a good view of the Colosseo (Coliseum) and extensive archeological ruins near by collectively called Palatino.

The streets around here have many uses. All but a few main thoroughfares are essentially ‘walk streets’ but everybody drives on them. The people and the vehicles, autos and many, many motorcycles, seem to be able to share them. At 7 am streets are empty and can’t even find a cup of capichino, 5 pm they are a mass with people and vehicles in every direction, at 7 pm there are a few bars that begin to put out tables and folks are dropping by for a glass of wine or beer. By 9:30 pm a street that earlier was dominated by people walking and the vehicles is miraculously full of restaurants, with tables and diners all over the place. Restaurants seem to sprout out of nowhere. In the neighborhood of my hotel (Hotel d'Inghilterra) is also a world class center of fashion. Every fashion name you’ve ever heard has a store. Eves Saint Lauraunt, Gucci, Givenchy, Armani, Galitzine, Bolla, Saldi (means Sale, just threw that in to see if you are checking), Hermes, Giuilli, Valentino, Prada, Bulgari, Celine, and so many I can’t remember, or spell – even Kalvin Cline – next Levis! And girls, girls, girls, all over the place with chick clothes on motor scooters with helmets. The helmet is as ubiquitous as the purse now. Long hair, tight pants, bare midriffs, dark skin, and they all fit! What a place. Roma. My hotel is Hotel d'Inghilterra and in an excellent location to walk to everything of interest. Another well located one is Hotel Colonna just west of the Via del Courso and Piazza Colonna.

Saturday, July 28, 01

Yesterday afternoon I got to the Trevi fountain, took a couple pictures and put my coin in (Three Coins in a Fountain) then walked to the Villa Borghese, described to me as the Hyde Park (London) or Central Park (New York) of Rome. This morning with an early start went back to the Sistine Chapel. Found a long line of people there with me before opening time. Instead of a chapel, it turned out to be the Vatican Museum, which is huge and contains the Sistine Chapel as one small part. Otherwise the museum seems to be many parts contributed by many Popes. Someone I was discussing it with, who claimed to be a Christian, said it is the collection of stuff confiscated, “stolen” by the Popes and their armies. Some from old Rome, but much from other places too, such as Egypt and other Mediterranean countries. Then, St. Peter’s Cathedral, the Pope’s church, is the most magnificent building and art in all of Rome, maybe Italy. Seems like it might be a couple blocks square. I also climbed to the top of the cathedral dome (called the Cupola) – view is great, probably the highest point in Rome. Sadly, there’s a lot of graffiti up there. Returning to the hotel I stopped to go through Castel of St. Angelo, neat but not as impressive as St. Peter’s, and Piazza del Popolo. Getting to Popolo, Realized I’d been going by it every morning in a taxi on the way to work.

Crime is not evident, but there’s bars on all the first story windows and there’s quite a lot of graffiti all over the place. All the windows on all floors have shutters, to block sun and burglars. Looks like many buildings are built on a square perimeter with an open courtyard in the middle. Commercial shops occupy the street level, and the three to five levels above are residences. A street level entry to the courtyard large enough for one car to pass through is heavily barred most of the time – but sometimes open with a guard watching the courtyard in day time. Some of these courtyards look like the Luve, with extensive large sculptures, roman columns, etc. Judging from the appearance of the streets at night, nobody ever eats dinner home.

It just seems impossible to over emphasize some of the things you see in Rome. Every window on every building framed in ornate arch work, big columns framing most entrances and many windows. Around every corner is a building that looks like a work of art, public and private – such buildings are few and always public in America. Every couple blocks is a big piazza with a 75 ft marble obelisk – the Redondo city council would croak if they had to pay for one of these – and beautiful huge fountains . The popular piazzas are just full of people all day and more so into the night – like Pier Ave in Hermosa on Saturday night – thousands of people out walking the streets and milling around the piazzas – Pantheon, Steps di Spagna, Navona, Trevi. Of course I am only exposed to about one square mile of downtown, and English is quite prevalent making life easier. As you drive around the further outlying parts of the city many parts of the old wall and aqueducts are present, still in good repair. Three kinds of police are prevalent everywhere, Poliza (city Police), Carabineri (federal or Military Police), and Guarda de Finanza (fiscal Police – we’ve dubbed them the Tax Police). Italian coffee is the pits. It’s ironic that a fad coffee shop in the US, called Starbucks, is making a few people rich – and a lot mote into lemmings, selling this stuff – or maybe they’ve learned how to do it better. Italian coffee comes in a thimble, like Brasilian, but isn’t as good and is drunk in one gulp like shot of whisky – Cappuccino is served luke warm with a froth of milk on top and tastes almost as good as a glass of warm milk – and a double cost me $4 this morning.