Art Bell opens with tributes to the late Dr. John Mack, killed by a drunk driver in London, and broadcaster Bill Balance, who passed at 85. He reports on Mount St. Helens repressurizing after spewing steam and ash, and speculates about drilling into volcanic domes to relieve pressure before catastrophic eruptions. He also notes the Navy dismantling its ELF submarine communication system, suggesting HAARP research may have produced a replacement technology.
Medical thriller author and physician Dr. Tess Gerritsen discusses her novel Gravity, which Art describes as the most absorbing book he has ever read. She recounts how the 1997 collision between a Progress module and the Mir space station inspired the story and details her research at NASA's Johnson Space Center, where engineers confirmed that payload inspection loopholes could allow unauthorized experiments aboard the station.
Gerritsen explains the physiological dangers of space travel, from bone calcium loss and kidney stones to the terrifying mechanics of decompression death, where blood progresses from boiling to frozen solid as pressure drops to vacuum. She reveals that NASA internally estimates one in fifty shuttle missions will end in disaster and describes psychological breakdowns among crews, including a two-week communication blackout by a grieving Mir commander.
