I can't believe it's been a month since I spent basically my entire weekend at the Museum of Flight watching the Guppy fly in and then getting to see the front section of the Full Fuselage Trainer (FFT - a fancy term for a wingless space shuttle that is used for training the astronauts).
The Guppy is one of my favorite planes; it just doesn't look like it is supposed to be able to fly!
Apparently, this plane is a composite in the sense that the wings come from the B-class bombers, the fusualage is from another plane, and the cockpit is from yet a third plane, and the cargo area was built up on top. In a lecture on day 2, one of the astronauts, Greg Johnson, who flies the Guppy talked a bit about its history - apparently the first version, the 'Pregnat Guppy', completely disconnected midway down the cargo area to load items. Now, the Super Guppy opens on a hinge on the left side of the plane:
The guppy was flown in by Johnson and then a female astronaut showed up - I never did catch her name, but I guess she was important? Johnson is actually from West Seattle and a UW grad, so it was fun for him to fly the Guppy here. One favorite moment happened when some person just showed up in an EVA suit mock-up. I've worn one before and, while kids love them, the one I wore was not comfortable at all!!
While the Guppy crew maneuved the plane into posistion in the museum's parking lot, all the VIPs and speakers mingled before the small welcoming ceremony, including the governor and Bonnie Dunbar, another local astronaut.
And in true Seattle form, it started to rain, though fortunately it started after the plane had landed! A rain delay would not have fun to stand through!
On day two of my weekend at the MoF, not only did I get to hear Astronauts Johnson and Foreman (I think Foreman spoke at a MUST conference once) talk about their experiences on the ISS and the history of the Guppy, but I got to the front end of the FFT up close!
It was actually to large for the lens I had with me that day, but I realized that I saw the FFT fully assembled in Houston when I flew on the microgravity plane a couple years ago:
Fun fact: on the other side of the FFT in the picture above, astronauts trained to detect thermal tile damage, right underneath the open cargo bay door!
I have oodles more pictures, but since I think everyone who reads this blog is also my friend of fb, you can see the rest of the pictures there! (Click here!)
Tonight I experienced one of the most incredible mixes of science and art. At an event hosted by the Seattle Science Center, part of their Science Luminaries Series, I experienced one of the most incredible evenings of art and science.
The evening was hosted by the Museum of Flight, in their new Space space - where the shuttle trainer will be arriving next weekend in the Supper Guppy!!! - which is an incredible building. I loved the giant images of the Milky Way and other beautiful parts of space spread across the walls in giant mural form.
First to speak was Pinky Nelson, who was an astronaut, is an astronomer, and works at WWU. He began with a compelling story about his flights on the shuttle and how he was one of 6 (I think that was the number) astronauts to fly solo in an untethered chair outside the ISS. First off - flying untethered would terrify me. Secondly, his mission was to catch a satellite IN THE MIDDLE OF SPACE. And guess what? An engineer made a mistake and gave a measurement for a vital pin as 1" longer than the actual. Thus he could not grab the satellite with the grapple he had and eventually tried gripping with with his hand via the solar panel - scary idea, as the edges could have cut through his gloves and he'd be dead faster than fast :/ I found some of the footage he showed us - I got chills watching it - click here to start at the appropriate spot. Also, he loves the Hubble. Which makes him close to my favorite astronaut, however I met one that worked on the last Hubble servicing mission, and so Pinky can't rate quite as high :)
I still want to get one of the Hubble Huggers patches...
They integrated the art really well into the program, as next came a couple from the Seattle Opera, performing a piece from Rachel Portman's The Little Prince, based off the book by the same title (which, incidentally, I own in French and English. Children's books are great for learning new languages!) Though there were no costumes and the scene was just verbally set for us and then the excerpts were sung, it was still powerful. My favorite line came when the pilot was describing his emotions when flying: I hold the stars in the palm of my hand. It was just captivating. Here is a clip with more than what we heard, the part that was performed is just the very beginning of the clip, before the pilot is asked to draw a sheep:
Then Dr. Bonnie Dunbar shared her story, which is eerily similar to mine: hailing from a small ranch in south east Washington (in the same area code as my grandparents!), she actually did her undergrad and PhD in my department at the UW - Materials Science and Engineering. I knew this about her, as we have lots of pictures from her and of her and of the space shuttle, all signed by her, hanging in our conference room. We even have a teeny tiny WA state flag flown with her on one of her missions. Granted, though our backgrounds are similar, our futures are likely vastly different. I'm not entirely sure I'd want to be an astronaut. I did run up and shake her hand during the intermission, as well as get a slightly awkward photo with her, but it's so hard to know what to say when you meet someone in an event like this. I really wanted to ask her about her experiences as a woman in the sciences, if she has any family of her own, etc, but I wanted to respect her time and the others waiting to shake her hand. It was really important to me that the little girl behind me meet her and hopefully be a bit more inspired to pursue a STEM career. I may still email her at her Boeing address and maybe I'll get a response, but in the meantime, please enjoy the awkward levels of this picture:
You can't really tell from this pic, but I'm definitely rocking both my NASA meatball and Zero-G pins on the lapel. I'm probably breaking some rule about wearing too many pins, but I love them both so much!
Post-intermission, the event transitioned into private space access, appropriate, seeing as WA has a number of companies working towards creating vehicles to ferry passengers to low earth orbit and beyond. Chris Lewicki, of Planetary Resources, gave a brief introduction to asteroids and why his company wants to try to access one - I mainly understood that there are SO MANY asteroids!!!
The next section was incredible - there's apparently an aerial arts school in West Seattle (where a person moves around high above the ground utilizing two strips of silk fabric), and they had a few performers come out and perform two pieces, Weightlessness and Space. The first piece featured a woman dressed in a bodysuit, painted in a way that reminded me a 'warrior princesses'. While her piece and ability was amazing to watch, it seemed kind of flashy, as she would grin at the audience and kind of 'show off' in a way. The second artist, however, was leagues more enaging. Not only was she dressed in a highly stylized, faux-astronaut suit, she wore a white helmet to complete the look, and her movements really evoked the idea of space. While her piece had just as many amazing moves as the first one, she really slowed down her movements, remaining still in a position for a number of seconds and included shapes that reminded me of someone gazing with wonder at the universe or crammed in a small exploration capsule. She also didn't show off as much, but was very much into creating this idea that she was in space, looking across the vast black spaces and exploring the area around her. It was a phenomenal combination of strength, grace, and trust in a piece of silk. (Materials note: I think that silk is considered the strongest natural fiber, as it is the only natural fiber that is in filament form, which means the long strands can be aligned to increase the material's strength.)
Beautiful.
I also couldn't help but be a bit envious of their upper body strength. I'm working on strengthening my arm and back muscles through rock climbing, but I still can't do a single pull-up :/
The evening ended with Mark Sirangleo, of Sierra Nevada Space Systems, talking about some of the cool NASA missions his company has contracted for, including the Mars Science Laboratory, and about the new crew vehicle they are developing based on some old Russian/NASA designs - it looks pretty sweet! He was showing an animation about the MSL's landing and frankly, I'm terrified. It just doesn't look like it's supposed to work and apparently they haven't tested all the parts together because it was too big!!! While trying to find the video he showed, I stumbled upon this terrifying video:
I know I'll watch the landing live if I'm awake, but gah! I hope it works!!
And that was it! 2 hours of some of most inspiring space, science, and art I've seen a long while. I wish whoever is reading this could have experienced this event. I was simply blown away with the evening and I really hope the Science Center continues to increase access to the sciences for adults, not just kids. I would love, love, love to see something like the Cal Acadamy's Nightlife at the science center, even if only once a month!
You probably don't remember, but earlier this year, I blogged a bit about the surprising backlash against a Best Buy commercial that only featured male tech leaders in the phone/app industry. I still don't have a huge issue with the commercial, but somebody in Best Buy's marketing department must have heard because just recently this new commercial started airing:
Thanks Best Buy for not only featuring women, but diverse women in science and technology! Plus, the commercial is doubly awesome because the first woman featured is my fantastic friend and fellow microgravity flyer, Meredith Perry! So great!
Long story short - last Friday I was awarded a second fellowship, this time from NASA's Office of the Chief Technologist. It's a newer fellowship, as the first class of fellows was selected last year. Now I had a choice between NASA and NSF for my PhD funding - which is a position I was thankful to be in - not many people get offered one fellowship, let alone two! Here are the fellowship stats:
NSF:
30k/yr stipend
All my tuition covered
Health Insurance
3 year duration
NASA
36k/yr stipend
$10,000 towards tuition
$1,000 towards health insurance
$9,000 for research supplies
$10,000 for relocation and housing while at a NASA center or other government lab during the summers
4 year duration
What to choose?! After some long email chains and lots of short-term stress, I think the university will cover the remainder of my NASA tuition, like they would if I had taken NSF. Monetary issues aside, the NASA Fellowship is doubly great because it has the summer opportunities built in - basically I have extra funding to go to each place I already wanted to go: NREL, Sweden and a NASA center. With NSF, I would have had to find more funding to get to NREL or Sweden and probably would not have gotten back to a NASA Center. While it was a surprisingly nerve-wracking choice in the end and I didn't tell NSF 'no' until the very last minute, I'm excited to say that I'm staying in the NASA Education Pipeline and am now one of the NASA Space Technology Research Fellows!
{side note: I love all of these prints from the who-knows-what-they-actually-are website Wander}
This video has been floating around the internet lately, but I thought I'd post it here for all my friends who might not generally watch NASA/space-inspired videos. yes, I know that if you're in my g+ "NASA Friends" circle, you've probably already seen it :) (also, this is so I can remember it later...)
watch is as you prepare your taxes. watch it with anyone you know who is thinking about being a scientist. who wouldn't be inspired by that incredible imagery? even though my goal in life is to build solar cells for people here on earth, I still dream of exploring space.
the only thing missing in the video? more women in science. there was one, did you see her in the orange flight suit?
tonight, I leave for a weekend in Florida. Yay for a large network of NASA Ames friends!
last night, while filling out application after application for summer internships/jobs - thanks, thesis project with no real funding - this song popped up on my mix:
my friends don't seem to know me / without my suitcase in my hand.
though I'm not really a lyrics person (not an auditory learner), the opening line seemed especially appropriate seeing as in the past 13 months, I have been in WA, NY (2x), AZ, CA (3x-ish), GA, MD (2x), TX, NJ, PA, MA and I have driven through or had a layover in IL, NC, CT, CO, OR (and probably a few other east coast states that I slept through).
Wow. So many states and so much time on planes! Ironically, I have yet to get a frequent flyer ticket - but that is what you get when you go for cheap prices over loyalty to one airlines....
yesterday, as I was getting frustrated with the kids in the lab that I TA, I realized just how many hours of my life I've lived in my lab coat. I should probably wash my lab coat, but I'm afraid I spilled something a long time ago that doesn't like water. Realistically, I probably haven't, but I don't want to accidentally destroy the laundry machine....
In contemplating the state of my lab coat, I realized that there are a large number of pictures of me in a lab coat floating around the internet, including this lovely image:
note - that is dry ice....I tried so hard to convince the photographer that we should represent 'real chemistry' (not that dry ice in water is not 'real chemistry,' but it feels like cheating...alas, we also had to use food coloring (!!!) he did not like my tiny bottle of blue azulene that I had worked for more than two quarters to synthesize :(
this was my expression in response to the photographer prompting: this is the coolest the reaction you've ever seen! yeah, right. food coloring in water - coolest thing ever.
drawing on windows while sporting my lab coat is always fun - this was the azulene project as well.
finally, I'm so glad NASA Ames switch to more professional headshots (see my google+ prof pic), since this was my 'action shot' one year:
and yep, it now resides on the NASA website, for all the world to see....
In some ways, this lab coat is my 'suit' while at work in the lab (which, somewhat unfortunately, also requires wearing pants and flat, closed-toe shoes), and clearly, not made for a female figure. But, as men probably developed the lab coat, it fits their shape, not mine. I can't complain too much, because I'm not willing to take my coat in to be more fitted due to a safety issue - I want the lab coat material as far away from my skin as possible if I spill something on it. A narrowly cut coat could hold the chemical close to my skin, which could just cause larger problems than me having to wear a baggy lab coat!
Recently, I finished reading Right Stuff, Wrong Sex by Margaret Weitekamp. With the subtitle of
‘America’s First Women in Space Program,’ I initially thought that the text
would center around the women who were tested as potential astronauts. However,
this book proved to discuss the background and development of Dr. William Randolph "Randy" Lovelace’s
Women in Space testing program, the political backlash against the program, and
the general cultural beliefs that stopped women from being a part of the
Mercury and Apollo programs. *Lovelace’s facility in Albuquerque became NASA’s
medical center, mainly because he was a leader in aviation medicine and working
on developing a space medicine research program.
Remember that the early space program began before the
women’s lib movement, so any consideration of a female for an astronaut could
be assumed to be tricky. What was surprising to learn was how under-the-table
Lovelace’s program had to operate because of the hostility he faced in the
political sphere. I was shocked to find out that President Johnson (Johnson
Space Center in Houston, TX is named after him) was very much against female
astronauts. A scribbled note from him in response to an inquiry about female candidates
from NASA’s Administrator is one of the only bits of a paper trail recording
the hostility of those in Washington against the women. Instead of his name, he signed 'Let's end this now!' in the space at the end of his note.
Overall, 25 female pilots were tested by Lovelace and 13
passed the week-long physical examination. Only three women were able to go on
to further testing, the not-so-official program was ‘officially’ cancelled only
5 days before the rest of the women were scheduled to fly to Pensacola, FL for
psychological testing. This was actually a most interesting test of how potential
astronauts handled total isolation: they floated in a pool, in a darkened room
for as long as the possibly could. Both the air and the water temperature were
matched exactly to the women’s body temperature, so apparently they didn’t even
feel the water when they splashed it!
I found myself frequently frustrated with the lack of
support for the women. The cultural standards and expectations for women could
be used against them – one women was in a congressional hearing testifying for
female astronaut candidates, was photographed with her heels off under the
table and that breech in expected etiquette was used to discredit her whole
testimony. The women found themselves with unsupportive employers, as many lost
their jobs when they left to be tested. Even the man running the physical
testing, Lovelace, did not envision these women as astronauts in the same sense
as male candidates. He expected that once space had been initially ‘colonized,’
women would be needed as lab technicians, secretaries, and space ‘homemakers.’ Ugh.
Even the most forward-thinking men of the time couldn’t get past the
traditional gender roles that permeated the American culture.
The tested women were all incredible pilots, most with
numerous flying records to their name and countless hours of flying time.
However, one of NASA’s requirements kept women out of the pilot’s seat on any
space-based aircraft for years to come: they had to have hours flying a jet aircraft. At that point in time,
only the military flew jets and the military did not allow women to fly
anything after the short-lived WASP program. So, regardless of how much they
fought to become candidates, the women could always be pushed out because there
was absolutely no way they could get the time they needed in a jet. Some women
even considered trying to privately fund the purchase and flying of a jet, but
that didn’t go anywhere in the end.
I was just slightly overwhelmed with the walls and roadblocks that these women faced in their campaign to fly to space. It
made me more than thankful to live in 2011, when even though I still feel the
cultural constraints of being a women in science, I have supporters. NASA so
destroyed the hopes of accomplished women for becoming astronauts that they had
to hire Nichelle Nichols, Uhura from Star
Trek, to recruit females and other minorities to the shuttle astronaut
core. Even then, as Weitekamp points out in the epilogue, there existed a
two-track system for the astronaut core: one for PhDs and MDs, called ‘mission
specialists,’ and one for pilots. There were a number of women who flew on the
shuttles before a female was actually selected to command and pilot a shuttle
mission.
FLATs (First Lady Astronaut Trainees) at one of Eileen Collins' launches on the space shuttle. Collins was the first woman to pilot the shuttle.
Really, this was a most interesting book and fascinating
read. I’m returning it to the library soon, so you should pick it up and read
it. While I was initially interested in because it was about early female
astronaut candidates, it really is a book anyone interested in gender equality
or even history of aviation medicine should read. It spun out of the author’s
thesis and is a well written book. Not too long either, I finished it in just 3
days by the pool :)
I just looked at my calendar - I'm flying on 7 planes between now and Christmas day.
I'm going to be in Seattle for a grand total of 4 more days before December 25th.
Tonight, I'm thankful that I'm getting paid to go to graduate school and that my profs don't believe in in-class finals :)
Tomorrow, I head to Albuquerque, Monday I'm giving my 'how to apply for graduate school' presentation to the students at NMSU and speaking on a panel about my NASA internship experiences. Apparently it is going to be cold in Albuquerque....hopefully no snow though!
Tues-Thursday are going to be crazy days. don't expect to hear from me. don't worry, I didn't fall off the face of the earth, I'm just going to be hiding in different spaces cramming everything in for my advisor (final + paper + presentation).
But then Friday I'm going to NYC! and Boston! To visit these fantastic people:
Yay!
And since my sol-gel class is finishing with a take-home final, a paper, and 'presentation' (but we just send our prof our slides, we don't actually present.....) I'm going to stay in NYC until Thursday!
Everything gets turned in Friday morning and then I'm DONE for the quarter! Hopefully I'm alive enough to go ice skating with my roommates and friends that evening......
And finally, Saturday I'm getting on another plane to Palm Springs with my family + family friends for a whole week of SUN. I am so excited to see the sun. So. Excited. I think I've forgotten what it looks like.....
It's easy for me to forget the big picture when I've been in my windowless office for days, but then I find something like this video. wow. did you see the Aurora Borealis?? and the lighting storms?? Even though I live in a big city, one of millions of people, the night images of the Earth, with all the bright city spots, reminds me just how big the world actually is - almost 7 billion people! And then I remember how small our little blue planet actually is in the grand scheme of the universe.
anyways. the likelihood of actually seeing the earth from space is slim, either on the ISS or on another space-bound mission. I'd be content to see the Aurora Borealis - it's going on my list of things to do when I spend a summer researching in Sweden!
oh. apparently NASA is opening Astronaut applications today......
I planned to video blog through the summer, completing my final internship at NASA Ames in CA...
Take a look how many blog posts happened from June - Aug... Zero. Whoops. Apparently, I was too busy to blog, but that doesn't mean I didn't keep taking pictures and videos!
So, after about 2 months of sitting in pieces on my computer, here are highlights from the entire summer in one video! (Covering 10 weeks of fun means it's kind of a longer video and has lots of titles...)
