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reaches orbit or reaches one of the abort landing sites. During the four-hour session, the crew will go through 8 to 10 launches, each with engine failures, electrical failures, jet failures, hydraulic failures, and/or computer failures. If the kitchen sink were active on launch, the training team would probably fail it too. 

When the crew is well into its training, it progresses from "stand-alone" simulator sessions (sessions involving only the crew, the training team, and the engineers who keep the simulator running) to "integrated" simulator sessions. All of Mission Control participates in these sessions, and they are more realistic than anything the crew will encounter until launch day. They serve to train not only the crew but also the flight controllers and engineers in mission control. The crew participates in 15 to 20 hours of integrated simulations per week during the last few months before flight. This is the culmination of simulator training that eventually reaches as much as 30 hours per week during the final two months. During that last month the simulator is like a second home--and kind of a cramped, dreary one at that. But the secret to the success of the NASA team--flight controllers, technicians, and astronauts, is the practice, practice, practice of simulations.

Shortly before flight, the crew goes to Florida for a dress rehearsal of the launch countdown. Everyone in the