Women In Space: Kathryn Hire On NASA’s Endeavour
The space shuttle Endeavour is in the midst of a two week mission to the International Space Station, and its crew includes Kathryn “Kay” Hire. Hire has one heck of a bio, with extensive Naval experience and years of engineering work under her belt.
Her time in space includes a stint on STS-90 Neurolab back in 1998, where she logged over 381 hours in space (Doesn’t that sound more impressive than the number of actual days?)
“During the 16-day Spacelab flight, the seven-member crew aboard Space Shuttle Columbia served as both experiment subjects and operators for 26 life science experiments focusing on the effects of microgravity on the brain and nervous system. The STS-90 flight orbited the Earth 256 times, and covered 6.3 million miles.”
The liftoff footage for Endeavour’s launch is amazing, though the on-shuttle camera cuts out a little.
Be sure to check out Kevin Lee’s impressive article about Hire, her family beginnings and later career, then listen to an interesting piece from Go Navy Radio that includes Hire and Wendy Lawrence, another Naval Academy grad to become an astronaut.
Lastly, visit NASA’s Space Shuttle site for more details on the mission. Once the mission completes, mission details will be stored under STS-130.
(Need some music to accompany all this reading material? Check out SOMA.fm’s streaming Mission Control channel, which mixes ambient music with real chatter from NASA’s STS-130 mission!)
Related posts:
- Women In Space: NASA’s Explorers
- More From Irene Klotz: NASA Leaving Space Station
- What Women Are Writing In Science: Irene Klotz & Jennifer Ouellette
- Breakfast With Astronaut Sunita Williams
- What Women Are Doing In Astronomy: Dr. Pamela Gay
February 16th, 2010 at 12:42 pm
Our youngest is actually named for Heidemarie M. Stefanyshyn-Piper, veteran of STS-115 and STS-126. We had Anousheh Ansari on campus recently too, a civilian who flew on Soyuz TMA-9 in ‘06. These are very inspiring women.
-Derek
February 16th, 2010 at 3:46 pm
What a cool name for your daughter, and what lofty heights to which she can aspire! Last year, Sunita Williams came to PSU and I was lucky enough to meet her:
http://dotfiveone.com/2008/06/breakfast-with-astronaut-sunita-williams/
Thanks for sharing, Derek!