HABITAT ENGINEERING 



John B. Tenney, Jr. 

 General Electric Company 



ABSTRACT 



This report describes the engineering and field support role 

 of the General Electric Company during the TEKTITE II program. 

 Initial activities include planning and habitat refitting in 

 Philadelphia. Habitat engineers were trained during this 

 period. Work in conjunction with habitat emplacement and 

 startup is described. After the habitat became fully opera- 

 tional, a field support team provided a 24-hour watch on the 

 habitat. Between scientific missions, maintenance tasks 

 were performed and the habitat was secured and recovered upon 

 completion. 



PLANNING 



Engineering planning activities for TEKTITE II were initiated immediately from 

 the beginning of the program. Technical plans drew heavily upon the experience 

 gained during TEKTITE I. During this precursor program, described in 

 References 1, 2, and 3, the same habitat structure was used to support a 4-man 

 crew for 60 days. As a result of this successful first mission, some changes 

 were required both in system hardware and in program operational procedures. 

 Several of the technical plans prepared for the Department of the Interior were 

 incorporated into their inclusive Program Plan (Ref. 4). These included: 



Habitat Emplacement Plan 



Habitat Safety Plan 



Public Affairs Plan 



LSD Loading and Unloading Plan 



Other technical planning documents which were prepared included: 



Habitat Refurbishment Specifications 



Field Operational Support Plan 



Habitat Engineers Handbook 



Emplacement and Startup Checklist 



Refurbishment Checklist 



Recovery Checklist 



Atmospheric Monitoring Specifications 



Maximum use was made of information and experience gained on TEKTITE I, and the 

 amount of technical software required was considerably less than for the previ- 

 ous program. Many of the key technical personnel from TEKTITE I were available 

 for TEKTITE II, and this increased efficiency during the planning phases. One 

 area of vital concern during the planning stages was habitat safety. Detailed 

 safety planning considered a wide range of credible accident conditions and 

 identified procedures and techniques to respond in all cases. A discussion of 

 TEKTITE safety planning is contained in Ref. 5. 



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