The Opal ops team performs initial contacts with Opal. They are attempting to communicate with Opal to fire picosatellites. Due to misconfigurations of the ground station, initial contacts were unreliable and difficult at best.
 
 

The SSDL Ops works on the ground station while preparing for an Opal pass. John Ellis, SSDL mentor, is standing on the left. Jamie Cutler is typing on the computer in the middle. Corina Hu is on the right. Greg Hutchins is back behind John and you can just see his leg and arm.

Jamie works on laptop while Greg and Corina look on. Looks like he's working on Procomm, a serial communication program, probably trying to talk to the engineering model of Opal.

Starting on the left, Prof Bob Twiggs, John Ellis, Henry Ouyang XXX, and Dan Oltrogge compare notes during a pass.

The ops team works on getting equipment ready. Looks like they are still working on communicating with the engineering model. The ground station was not functioning properly during the first several weeks of operation. In fact, work is still in progress (as of 4/23/00).

It's all about connectors. Jamie pulls out connectors for Greg with the radio while Corina checks her watch and says, "Boys, you're running out of time!"