QUESTION:
I would like to know how long it took to prepare for this mission? 

ANSWER from Al Harper on October 14, 1995:
I have been working on this mission (the "Live From Antartica" flights)
for about a year now. This is not too different from the length
of time we spend getting ready for our typical science research
flights-- we have to propose to NASA to do some particular observations
(say, of some nebula, galaxy, or planet) in March or April for flights
which will occur in the year starting later during the month of 
October (and the flights themselves may not take place till the 
following September).

How does this compare with the length of time you have to prepare for
things you want to do (maybe something like a family vacation or a 
school play or a music recital)? You'll probably find that as you get
older and the things you want to do involve more and more different
people that the preparation time will get longer, too. Still, it's
nice to be able to do things as fast as possible, so you can go on to
even more interesting things. One of the nice things about airborne
astronomy (compared to doing things in space) is that the airplane can
fly many different "missions" every year. Lots of different research
groups can build instruments for the KAO, then modify them to make
them better on time scales short enough for students to be closely
involved in the whole project (maybe two to three years). Some space
projects may take twenty years or more to design, build, and execute.

Hope you got to see the "Live from Broadcast"-- and that it got
across the idea that science is interesting and fun-- and that all kinds
of people can be involved.

Al Harper