[21] The contract for the Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) Feeding System Assembly was awarded in September 1967 to the Whirlpool Corp., St. Joseph, Mich. At that time NASA flight food experience was based primarily on the manned Gemini flights. Apollo flights were anticipated but the food was designed and produced on the basis of the Gemini flight experience.
NASA did not fly a feeding system again until late in 1968. During this time, NASA relied quite heavily upon MOL food production and simulator testing for maintaining space-feeding expertise. Since the flight of Apollo 7 the flow of information has reversed, and the MOL feeding system optimization has benefited from NASA's flight experience.
The MOL feeding system contract is a straightforward document. The Gemini qualified feeding system is defined and quantified, allegedly in sufficient detail to allow production and flight qualification. Ample documentation exists to define the feeding systems used aboard the manned Gemini flights.
With the expectation that procurement of MOL feeding system foods for validation in simulator studies would be a simple matter, an order for food was initiated. The School of Aerospace Medicine was to conduct these simulator studies early in 1968 in response to requirements defined by the MOL Systems Office. The first production started soon after official notification of the food requirements. At this point the lack of sufficient quantification of the space foods became painfully apparent. It became evident that a comprehensive, integrated effort was a necessity in order to assure complete and accurate quantification of the food items listed on the MOL contract schedule. Forty-five items were included in this schedule. In September 1967 these foods were as follows, where GFP denotes Government furnished property from the U. S. Army Laboratories, Natick, Mass.
[23] By September 1968 some of the food items had been changed and the following foods were on the schedule. GFP denotes Government furnished property; FI denotes food with improved to enhance texture, flavor, stability, and rehydratability; ID denotes an item dropped because it was deemed impractical to produce because of manufacturing problems, acceptability, and stability; and R&D denotes a food item deemed salvageable and returned to the laboratory for upgrading and improvement.
Representatives from the Whirlpool Corp. and the U. S. Army Natick Food Laboratory agreed that the production guides were not suitably standardized to serve as specifications. At this point, we undertook to involve the responsible technologists in defining the inconsistencies of the production guide system and suggesting corrective action. The most obvious inconsistencies were:
A brief explanation of these inconsistencies is warranted at this time. The food production guides as represented to the MOL Systems Office had been used by NASA for procuring flight foods. However, the flexibility of these guides allowed NASA to modify and optimize foods from flight to flight. The early spaceflight experience was intense, and timely responsiveness for food modification was imperative. The documents were not in any way to be construed as specifications. The subsequent incorporation of these production guides into the MOL feeding system contract as specifications posed a unique contracting problem. The contractor assumed the challenge that these foods presented and attempted to produce foods described in the documents.
Previous NASA food-production history served as a sound basis on which to determine realistic end-product requirements. Reevaluation of sampling plans and quality assurance provisions in light of NASA production experience gave us workable, but admittedly incomplete, sampling techniques. Microbiological testing methods had been thoroughly reviewed during the Gemini flights and were improved in workability and reliability. However, the production techniques, raw ingredients, and testing procedures did not adequately reflect changing production methodology, and they added confusion and uncertainty to interpretation of the production guides.
[25] The first delivery of MOL simulator foods represented a best effort on the part of the contractor to produce a product as it was intended. The documents used to produce this best effort were partially corrected prior to food production but were extensively revised and updated after the second MOL food simulator study in June 1968. The experience gained from the two MOL food shipments proved valuable to both MOL and NASA. We began to realize that if we ever intended to describe foods and feeding systems before the fact, we would need considerable effort expended on documenting and quantifying the end products. The contractor for both the Apollo and MOL feeding systems was the logical choice to assume this effort. Consequently, Whirlpool Corp. was directed to expend development effort, under the development portion of the MOL Feeding System Assembly contract, toward updating and definitizing production documents. Technical and editorial monitoring was and is carried out through the Aerospace Feeding Systems Liaison Officer at the Natick Labs.
The effort to date has resulted in 24 rewritten documents:
|
Title |
|
|
. | |
|
(1) Beef, rehydratable, dehydrated |
3C |
|
(2) Beef, bites, dehydrated |
4C |
|
(3) Chicken and gravy, dehydrated |
7B |
|
(4) Chicken and vegetable, dehydrated |
8B |
|
(5) Chicken salad, dehydrated |
10B |
|
(6) Cinnamon toast, dehydrated (bite size) |
21B |
|
(7) Cereal fruit cubes, dehydrated (bite size) |
23B |
|
(8) Toasted bread cubes, dehydrated (bite size) |
24B |
|
(9) Cocoa beverage powder |
26B |
|
(10) Freeze-dehydrated peach bar |
27B |
|
(11) Freeze-dehydrated fruit-cocktail bar |
28B |
|
(12) Puddings (apricot, banana, butterscotch, and chocolate) |
29C |
|
(13) Sugar-coated corn flakes and toasted oat cereal |
30B |
|
(14) Fruitcake (bite size) |
34B |
|
(15) Pea bar, sweet, dehydrated |
35C |
|
(16) Tea, instant w/sugar and lemon |
37B |
|
(17) Dehydrated soups (corn chowder, pea soup) |
38B |
|
(18) Corn bar, cream style, dehydrated |
41C |
|
(19) Applesauce, instant, frozen, dehydrated |
46A |
|
(20) Potato soup, frozen, dehydrated |
49 |
|
(21) Cracker cubes, compressed |
51 |
|
(22) Drink, natural fruit flavored, powdered |
53 |
|
(23) Beverage breakfast, powdered |
54 |
|
(24) Imitation ice cream mix, dehydrated, cubed |
55 |
The objectives of this effort have been threefold: (1) to standardize the format and the content of all space-food production documents, (2) to establish realistic end-product [26] requirements and quality assurance provisions, and (3) to reflect technological improvements in the food production documents. The rewriting effort will be completed shortly. The most critical requirement for food production documents today is assurance that the mechanism for timely inclusion of proven improvements in space foods is preserved. This demands the establishment of a meaningful and comprehensive feedback system. Both flight and simulator experience must be used to assure a practical and workable food system.
Ultimate quantification of the MOL feeding system will continue to be a fluid and challenging endeavor, responsive to NASA flight experience, food technology improvements, and MOL crew and simulator study input. The improvement of the foods we presently have in the MOL menu is largely dependent upon the reactions gained from test subjects involved in the simulator studies at the USAF School of Aerospace Medicine. Recent feedback from the manned Apollo flights has given us added insight into the acceptability and palatability of our present space foods. Improvement and modification of foods for aerospace use can be best accomplished when we consider the following requirements:
With consideration of the aforementioned criteria, we undertook to design an evaluation system that would give us sufficient information to predict the success or failure of new and modified foods for use in space feeding applications. We were obliged to consider such practical criteria as the number of high-cost samples we could constructively evaluate and the requirement for timely submission of recommendations. Experience has proven that a trained sensory evaluation panel evaluating space foods subjected to controlled temperatures and time provides valuable insight into the stability of the foods. The information proves valuable when a decision as to whether the food should be flown or subjected to additional testing is sought.
The MOL Feeding System Assembly contract has a provision stating that all developmental and production foods are to be submitted to a sensory panel for evaluation. Accurate panel results are dependent upon the size of the panel, the design of the test, and the analysis of the results, to name but a few variables. The most critical need, however, is to be able to assure reproducibility between different testing organizations.
With no real flight data early in the MOL contract period, we relied quite heavily upon the experience of the contractor and the technologists in determining and evaluating human factors elements. Gemini foods that had been upgraded and improved for Apollo were reexamined. Technical advances allowed us to incorporate more natural characteristics into the foods that were being squeezed from flexible pouches. Bite-size foods that did not require preparation after opening the package still posed problems. Coatings that had been designed to control crumbling in the critical Gemini flights took on less importance with Apollo and MOL.
[27] Space food as we know it today is essentially the result of a cooperative NASA/MOL development and testing effort. Production experience coupled with simulator and flight experience has given us a food system that is essentially sound. Formulation changes that have proven more acceptable to simulator subjects and in limited crew testing have been incorporated into the MOL foods. Apollo has incorporated some of the more desirable immediate advancements in each flight. The original 45 space food items in the MOL schedule have grown to 54 food items:
Beverages:
Throughout the space-feeding program, from malted milk tablets in the first Mercury flights to our present dehydrated and thermostabilized foods, reliability and safety have been the watchword. A good portion of reliability can be attributed to food packaging. The food processing itself contributes largely to the initial food quality and the food's ability to resist extremes of environment when packaged properly. Classically, therefore, space foods are designed and produced to assure highly reliable foods after long-term storage. We wish to assure maximum flexibility of food availability for any flight configuration.
At the present time the foods we fly routinely will withstand temperatures of 100° F for 6 months or longer, and many of the foods will withstand up to 1 year at 100° F. Dehydrated foods can be expected to be subjected to these conditions without serious detriment to the flavor, but their acceptability is certainly not improved. NASA is presently in the process of a comprehensive 2-year study of space food stability and nutrient analysis. The results should give us valuable information about the expected changes in food on long-duration space missions. By combining several of the more desirable storage environments, e.g., by freezing dehydrated foods, we can expect to extend the storage life of current foods significantly. Frequently we are approached with the "new" concept of using ready prepared convenience foods, either fresh, refrigerated, or [29] frozen. Stability remains the ill-defined quality characteristic that defies quantification and relegates these foods to short-term planned usage.
MOL and NASA made available to the U. S. Army Natick Laboratories sufficient financial assistance to construct an environmental-control food-processing facility. Construction of this facility will afford the research staff an environment wherein studies of processing variables may be quantified and optimized. Extraneous contamination can be controlled and frequently omitted from the food processing procedures. The ultimate results will help define and specify requirements for foods expected to endure long periods of storage or exposure to rigorous environmental conditions.
Variety and improvement of foods will continue as long as technology in food research is active. New-generation spacecraft will allow much of our food development and research to be reapplied to the next generation of spacecraft. Compression and miniaturization of operational rations have been studied for many years by the U. S. Army Natick Laboratories. This effort, closely allied with the space food development effort, should serve as a sound base for the new and unique feeding applications we anticipate for the future.