Entry 06 - Shoot Schedule Extended

October 18, 2007

Entry 06 - Homestay, Salt Lake City, UT

Today could be summed up in one word: HAIL. Or, to be more precise, in four words: HAIL, HAIL, HAIL, and HAIL! Because that’s the number of times it did!! We’re not sure how many of you reading this have ever tried to shoot interviews inside the back of truck with a plastic roof when it’s hailing, but we don’t recommend it. In fact, being on the inside of a huge metal hanger isn’t that much better, to be frank. The ad weather here isn’t just messing up the competing teams’ schedules!

As the title of the posting states, upon the urging of Ben Shelef (the program director of the games), we have officially decided to extend our shooting schedule an extra two days -- that is, barring any unforeseen difficulties such as the need to return our rented equipment as originally scheduled, which would be a problem. Assuming everything falls into place we will be making calls tomorrow to secure later flights, extended rentals, food, lodging, transportation, insurance, and new shooting schedules. In other words … keep your fingers crossed for us!

Because of the inclement weather (except when the sun would break through the clouds after we had all moved inside, of course) many of the teams were able to qualify on a tether suspended from the ceiling of the second hanger. Qualification for a teams simply means that they can prove that their climber and the rigging attached to it are safe, functional, and able to ascend up the tether. And it wasn’t always easy, even inside with zero wind and no other natural elements to contend with. But, in the end, all the teams that attempted to qualify did so. The plan tomorrow is for the laser and microwave power beaming teams to qualify, possibly even outside.

The rest of the day was filled with shooting, mostly interviews where and when we could. But it's amazing what a little set dressing can do! Not to mention having to communicate and get to know the different teams so well. This morning we were invited to have Saki with the Japanese team in their RV and ths afternoon we were invited to drink beer with the team from the University of British Columbia. Two offers, we should add, that we will be accepting. ;-)

Before calling it a night, we wanted to direct you to two web pages you might find interesting. The first is a short animation made about the space elevator itself, and something that might appear in our final documentary. Secondly is a link to the live Space Games webcams that will be set up! There are still bugs to be worked out in the webcams, but once they are up and running, you will be able to see relatively images updated once a minute.

That’s it for now. Once again, bedtime has come and gone. More soon, so stay tuned!