Mission Control for the ISEE-3 Reboot Project is located in Building 596 at NASA Ames Research Park adjacent to NASA Ames Research Center and Moffett Field in the heart of Silicon Valley. Building 596 is more commonly known as “McMoons” given that it is an abandoned McDonalds. When our Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project was looking for a temporary location in 2007 we had two choices: the old barber shop or a McDonalds that had just been closed. We picked the old McDonalds. Our friend Lynn Harper quickly came up with the name “McMoons” and it stuck.
Since our project to restore 50 year old hardware and recover all of the images from original data tapes sounded like some sort of improbable sci fi movie we put a pirate flag in the window – a symbol often associated with “Skunk Works” i.e. secret projects. We were kidding of course sinc enothing was secret. Well, the flag is still in the window, faded after 7 years. Our experience working with old hardware, forgotten technologies, and retired NASA employees prepared us well for the ISEE-3 Reboot Project.
McMoons is located here at NASA Ames Research Park at Moffett Field, CA. Next to our building (Building 596) is a 50 year old Titan 1 ICBM that we’re helping students to restore, upgrade, and transform into a teaching tool. We like to make old stuff work.
More information on McMoons can be found here. More images below. Click on images to enlarge.
