![]() “What I can credit is people believing in me, but also the role models I had. No one told me that that was unattainable. Koch replied: “When you look at the missions from 50 years ago, they looked very different than what you’re seeing here and I feel fortunate that, when I told my kindergarten teachers and all the teachers after that, I wanted to be an astronaut, they supported me. Did they run into a set of assumptions from parents, teachers and others about who an astronaut is – and isn’t? ![]() On Wednesday the Guardian asked Koch and Glover about the challenge of growing up without obvious role models in a space program dominated by white men. During 168 days there he completed four spacewalks, spoke with vice-president Kamala Harris and delivered a university commencement address. Glover served as pilot and second-in-command on the SpaceX Crew Dragon Resilience and became the first Black astronaut to live on the International Space Station as part of a long-duration mission. He was working as a legislative fellow in the office of Senator John McCain in 2013 when he was selected as an astronaut. He joined the navy while still in college, was a test pilot in F-18 fighter jets and flew combat missions in Iraq. Glover, pilot, was born in Pomona, California, and holds various qualifications in engineering and military operational art and science. Photograph: Josh Valcarcel/Nasa handout/EPA The official crew portrait for Artemis II: Nasa astronauts Christina Koch, Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman (sitting) and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen. Koch holds the world record for the longest spaceflight by a woman with a total of 328 days, and took part in the first all-female spacewalks. The Nasa website says she enjoys “backpacking, rock climbing, paddling, surfing, running, yoga, community service, photography and travel”. She studied electrical engineering at North Carolina State University in Raleigh and was selected as a Nasa astronaut in 2013. Koch grew up in Jacksonville, North Carolina, and spent summers on her family’s farm in Michigan. Koch, mission specialist, noted on Wednesday that the many teams working on the mission “are a little bit different than the last time we went back to the moon, because we are going in an era this time where we go for all and by all, where everyone who has a dream and who’s willing to work hard on that dream is welcome at the table to contribute, and we’re going to be more successful as a result ”. The agency that does its best to stay above the political fray is aware of the potency of representation when it comes to public support and congressional funding. Nasa administrator Bill Nelson has called it “humanity’s crew”. Instead of a plastic box, the blue flight-suited astronauts spoke in an open-air courtyard dominated by the Spirit of Haida Gwaii, a bronze sculpture of 13 mythological figures in a canoe.īut the most obvious break from the Apollo era was the diversity of the crew.Ĭhristina Koch is the first woman and Victor Glover the first person of color assigned to a lunar mission. The turnout for a press conference at the Canadian embassy was more modest than for Armstrong and company. The four astronauts – three Americans and a Canadian – who will fly around the moon on Nasa’s Artemis II came to Washington last week to charm members of Congress and the media. More than half a century later, humans are now finally going back to earth’s nearest neighbour and, once again, are obliged to sell the enterprise to the public.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |