Mike Mullane - Riding Rockets

On this same trip, Mike and Diane Coats and Donna and I, along with Admiral Dick Truly and a handful of other senior NASA officials, traveled to the Pentagon for Mike’s and my astronaut wings ceremonies. The gold astronaut pin was a NASA tradition. The military recognized their astronauts in a separate ceremony with the pinning of aviator wings bearing the astronaut shooting star on the center shield. Every military astronaut considered the award of astronaut wings to be the highlight of their careers. Mike and I were no exception. We had dreamed of this day as ensign and second lieutenant. For me, the ceremony would hold even greater significance. I would become the rarest of USAF weapon systems operators (guys in back of fighters). I would be the first WSO astronaut. It was a very small first, to be sure, but I was looking forward to hearing the USAF acknowledge it.

Diane and Donna were just as thrilled as Mike and I. It was their payday for a lifetime of sacrifice for their man’s career, for the terror of the T-9 minute walk to the LCC roof. They would be recognized and toasted for their contributions and bravery. They wore new dresses and shoes and had perfect hair and makeup. I hadn’t seen Donna look more radiant and more expectant since she had walked down the aisle in her wedding gown. She loved the pomp and circumstance of formal military events, as our astronaut wing pinnings promised to be.

Our first visit was to the chief of naval operations for Mike’s ceremony. As we approached the CNO’s office we were greeted by the CNO himself, Admiral James D. Watkins, beaming with almost fatherly pride and stepping forward to heartily shake Mike’s hand and hug Diane. Behind him waited a gauntlet of lesser admirals. They were dressed in whites, their epaulets dripping in gold braid, their chests festooned with ribbons and gold wings. It was as if every flag officer in the U.S. Navy had come to congratulate Mike. Each of them smiled broadly and rendered Mike and Diane a deference becoming royalty. Donna and I and the rest of the NASA entourage greeted the CNO and then melted to the sides of the room to let the spotlight focus on Mike and Diane. We’d have our fifteen minutes of fame in a moment.

While waiting I looked at the CNO’s wall art. There were gold-gilded paintings of Old Ironsides firing a broadside into an enemy ship, of dogfighting Japanese Zeros and Corsairs, of battleships pounding an enemy atoll. The art complemented the statement the CNO was making with the party, that the U.S. Navy was a service of unmatched history and glory, and new astronaut Mike Coats was the latest addition to that history.

White-gloved stewards orbited the gathering and served finger sandwiches and pastries from silver platters. I looked at Donna. She was in heaven. This was pomp and circumstance beyond anything she had expected and she knew she was up next.

The CNO began the pinning ceremony with comments on the importance of space to U.S. Navy operations. He highlighted the fact that one of our STS-41D communication satellites was a navy fleet UHF relay. He thanked Mike for laying his life on the line for the navy and thanked Diane for her years of wifely support. He then invited Diane to do the astronaut wing-pinning. In word and deed he made her feel that Mike’s new wings were as much her award as they were his. The CNO then led his throng of admirals in loud applause. The entire program had been first-class from start to finish.

We all bid our thanks and departed for the office of the vice chief of staff of the air force, General Larry D. Welch. For some reason the chief himself was unavailable but we didn’t care; we were certain the number-two man in the U.S. Air Force would take good care of us. Donna was biting at the bit to get there. The gleam in her eye said it all. She was anticipating the identical “Queen for a Day” treatment she had just seen rendered to Diane. So were we all.

Our first indication that things were to be a little different on the air force side of the Pentagon occurred as we neared the office. No generals awaited us. Instead, a lowly captain rose from his desk, welcomed us, and then said, “Please wait here. I’ll see if the general can see you.” I felt Donna tense at my side. If there was any pomp and circumstance around, it was well hidden. I whispered, “Maybe the party is set up in a different room.”

She replied tersely, “I hope so.” I was beginning to have a very bad feeling.

The captain emerged from the vice chief’s office. “The general is now ready to see you.”

Jesus, I thought, this has more the air of a court-martial than an awards celebration. I could hear Donna’s molars grinding in her rising anger. The rest of our entourage exchanged wondering looks. The contrast to the manner of welcome given Mike and Diane at the CNO’s office could not have been greater.

Our group entered the vice chief’s office and my worst fears were realized. It was just him, General Larry Welch, and his aide. There was no celebratory cake—no celebratory anything. Even the room seemed cheap compared with the CNO’s office.

I presented the general with a framed photo of the launch of STS-41D and tried to inject some levity into what was unfolding as a severe embarrassment for our group. I joked, “General, the only way the space shuttle could look better was if it had USAF emblazoned on the wings.”

The general didn’t find the comment the least bit amusing. Instead, he launched into a discussion on the air force budget and how important it was for money to be spent on the development of a new cargo airlifter, not on a new air force–manned space program. I wanted to scream, “It was a joke, general!”

The rest of the ceremony—if it could be called that—was quick. The general pinned the wings on my uniform, shook my hand, and posed for a photo. He made no comment about the fact I was the first nonpilot air force officer ever to fly in space. Then the aide hustled us out of the office so the general could get back to work on those airlifters. I had never been more embarrassed for my service. USN Admiral Truly had seen the debacle. Mike and Diane had seen it all. The NASA officials with us had seen it. The navy treated theirs like royalty; the air force treated Donna and me like an interruption. I wanted to crawl under a rock.

I held Donna’s arm as we walked from the office, and I could feel her trembling in rage. She had received no acknowledgment from General Welch. This was supposed to have been the highlight of my career, and, by proxy, her life. She had put me in that rocket. To do it, she had buried friends, and consoled widows, and kissed her husband off to war, and endured four shuttle countdowns including one engine-start abort. As we exited the office, Donna cursed under her breath. It was a mark of her extreme outrage: I was the foul mouth of the family—Donna never swore. The aide was close enough to hear the word, but I doubted he had any idea as to the reason for the outburst. I knew the general was clueless about how close he had come to feeling the wrath of a woman scorned. His obliviousness reminded me of something an air force pilot had once said in Vietnam, “We’ve all seen tracers coming at us and think that’s the closest we’ve come to death. In reality, some gomer in a rice paddy has probably fired an old single-shot rifle at us and the bullet passed within a foot of our heads and we never knew.” As a combat veteran, I’m sure General Welch had his “I was this close to death” stories, but in reality the closest he ever came to death was by the hands of my wife in his Pentagon office, not in the skies of Vietnam.

The manner in which I had been treated cleared up one source of wonder for me. Over the years, I could not understand why the air force hadn’t done something about Abbey’s preferential treatment of the navy astronauts. The next three missions to follow STS-41D were all to be commanded by navy pilots. On one of those, navy captain Bob Crippen would be flying his third mission as a shuttle commander before his peer, USAF colonel Karol Bobko, would fly his first. Why didn’t the USAF see this as I and the other air force astronauts did—a slap in the face of the air force? Now I had my answer. The shuttle program and its air force astronaut corps were invisible to the top leadership in the U.S. Air Force. We were interruptions to more pressing business. When I got back to JSC, I spread the depressing word to others within the air force community. “Don’t expect help from the Pentagon. We’re on our own,” was my message. Abbey could do whatever he wanted with us and there would be no outrage from our leaders. We were a forgotten squadron.