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it is my privilege to introduce our

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guest speaker tonight mr. gene Kranz

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gene joined NASA in 1960 is chief of the

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flight operations branch he served as

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one of the original project mercury

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assistant flight directors and his

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flight director for the Gemini program

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in 1969 he became chief of the flight

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control division and served as flight

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director for Apollo and Skylab among his

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achievements during Apollo was serving

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his flight director for the first lunar

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landing of Apollo 11 and playing a lead

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role in the mission control centers

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successful efforts to return Apollo 13

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genes been awarded many awards as you

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might imagine to NASA exceptional

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service medals three NASA distinguished

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service medals AI double a's lawrence

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speery award the AAS spaceflight award

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the robert r gill roots award the Arthur

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Eze swimming award the National Space

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Club astronautics engineer award the st.

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louis university presidents award the

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presidential medal of freedom and for

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presidential rank awards is my distinct

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honor this evening to introduce our

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thank you

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to yell so you probably want to turn the

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volume down on your control unit there

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through a pleasure to have the

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opportunity to be here in Huntsville

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this evening and have the opportunity to

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speak to operators you know operations

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is literally an art it's really

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something where virtually every day

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you're faced with decisions no ambiguity

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go or no-go Slayer no state launch or

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hold so it's really a great opportunity

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to basically congratulate you and the

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career selection that you've made you

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know I was I was a young fighter pilot

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in Korea flying the f-86 and one day I

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came down from a flight and makrooh

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chief told me that Soviet Union had

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launched a Sputnik and I had no clue

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what they were talking about except that

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this was a small basketball-sized

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satellite that was a circling the Earth

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and I could look up to the heavens and

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say there's some new object up there and

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I don't understand what it's all about I

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also had a high level of frustration

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because when we were over in Korea we

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could see the Soviet MiG's with about a

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two thousand foot altitude advantage on

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us and this was a concern so literally

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another nation had captured the high

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ground in space I came and did a couple

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years as a flight test engineer in the

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early jet bombers the b-52 and be 47 and

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then I saw an advertisement in aviation

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week that indicated they were forming a

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space class group and they're looking

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for qualified engineers to determine the

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feasibility of putting an American in

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space well gee that sounds like a pretty

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cool job so I filled out the standard

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government form 52 centered in

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didn't hear anything from NASA and now I

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was faced with the career choice what am

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I going to do and about the time I was

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either going to go back out to Edwards

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with one of the f force or go back to

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st. Louis and I got a call they said are

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you still interested and I said

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certainly they said when can you report

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and I said give me a couple weeks to two

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weeks later I was back at Langley field

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in Virginia and we went into pool

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because they were still setting up the

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structure of the space Task Group and

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they had a launch operations under merit

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Preston and they had recovery operations

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under jury hammock and they had

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trajectory design under Johnny Marin and

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you didn't know who I'd be working for

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it so they gave you a whole bunch of

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manuals and they studied these manuals

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and got reasonably familiar with what a

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spacecraft look like which was the

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pointy end that was the end that would

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up and uh two weeks after I was on the

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job gentleman comes up tasked me in the

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shoulder and says I'm chris-craft you're

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working for me and I want you to go down

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to the cape and write a countdown write

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submission rules and when you're through

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give me a call and we'll come down and

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launch operations at that time was sort

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of like playing Sandlot baseball where

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you throw the bat you move up you get

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chicken claws up the top and that's a

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guy who gets the first choice of picking

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the players and that was basically the

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nature of operations as we moved into

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the Mercury program at the time that we

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started our world was vastly different

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our nation would soon be torn by the

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beginning of the conflict in Vietnam

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during that decade of the 60s we would

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see three political assassinations and

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the civil rights movement was just

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emerging within the nation the cold war

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with Soviet Union provided the stimulus

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for the space program that guided every

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aspect of America's foreign policy

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computers existed only in laboratories

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there are no global communications and

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in that decade American students would

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riot in the caf

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then in 1961 a young brash and

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articulate president john f kennedy

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issued a challenge he said we choose to

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go to the moon we choose to go to the

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moon in this decade and do the other

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things not because they are easy but

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because they are hard and issued this

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challenge as we were struggling to put a

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spacecraft into orbit one month prior

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the speech we had blown up our second

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Atlas rocket 11 days prior the speech we

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had launched Alan Shepard so he had a

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total of twenty minutes manned space

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flight experience we'd never been to

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orbit and we were directed to go to the

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moon so engineers and people experience

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in flight tests in a small group of 31

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Canadians and Englishmen from the

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Cracker Jack Avro Arrow flight test teen

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joined with the mercury 7 astronauts at

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Langley field in Virginia to form a

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space task group that would win

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supremacy in space our boss was Walt

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Williams well it was the toughest man I

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have ever known he is a brawler is more

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fitted the working as a longshoreman New

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York or San Diego or San Francisco than

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leading the American space program but

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the business of aircraft like Tess

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Williams was a legend he is a pioneer

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director of the NACA high speed test

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station that today we call Edwards Air

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Force Base there's a project manager for

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the x1 rocket ship that a 1947 took

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Chuck Yeager and the world into the age

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of supersonic flight Williams deputy was

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prophetically named Christopher Columbus

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craft Chris developed the concept for

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spaceflight operations he directed the

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implementation of the worldwide tracking

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network launched each one of the mercury

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missions but most importantly he was the

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mentor the teacher the tutor for the

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first generation of young people that

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became known as mission controllers

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mercury control did not have a single

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computer there were three mainframe

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computers supporting all of Project

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Mercury two of these mainframes were 700

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miles north of the Cape at greenbelt

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maryland goddard space flight center

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because IBM did not trust us to operate

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computers

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and these machines were the first solid

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state machines ever produced by BM on

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the island of Bermuda we put a reliable

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vacuum tube computer because we we and

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we always lost eastward over the island

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such that if we lost communications with

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our crew during card flight the team in

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place would tell the astronauts what to

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do when the engine shut down global

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communications consisted of a sixty word

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permitted teletype network that dated

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back to the days of America's Pony

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Express 1860s so after a couple weeks

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training in spacecraft systems and

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operations and after we all became very

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proficient in Morse code because Morse

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code was our backup form of

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communication within the ground tracking

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network as L is between the team on the

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ground and the crew in space once we

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achieved this proficiency we sent young

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men to 13 tracking stations around the

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world they went into the heart of Africa

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they went to Zanzibar Australia ships at

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sea and islands of the Pacific these

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were sites that were literally at the

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ends of the earth and the risk to the

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young people at sites was very high