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kyburgkidsneedscience:
Happy Birthday, Michael Collins!
While humans have been dreaming of flight since the dawn of time, it wasn’t until the turn of the nineteenth century that the Wright brothers achieved that magical 59 second flight covering 852 feet, skimming over the beach not more than twenty feet off the ground. The new science of flight and aeronautics was born and after thousands of years of dreaming about flight, it only took another two and a half decades to coin the term astronaut (and the related cosmonaut) and set the bar higher for flight. A combination of two Ancient Greek words aster meaning star and nautes meaning a sailor, an astronaut was a sailor of stars.
More than that though, these early pioneers of both space and technology became heroes of popular imagination. They inspired generations of young boys and girls into science and technology and the technology derived from the space program has enriched our everyday lives from breakfast foods to automobile safety.
Today is the birthday (born October 31, 1930) of astronaut Michael Collins, the ‘third’astronaut on the Apollo 11 mission. In the forty plus years since Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to set foot on the moon, Michael Collin’s has been called the loneliest human alive as he waited in the capsule orbiting the lunar surface. Quite the contrary, Collins says:
Far from feeling lonely or abandoned, I feel very much a part of what is taking place on the lunar surface. I know that I would be a liar or a fool if I said that I have the best of the three Apollo 11 seats, but I can say with truth and equanimity that I am perfectly satisfied with the one I have. This venture has been structured for three men, and I consider my third to be as necessary as either of the other two. I don’t mean to deny a feeling of solitude. It is there, reinforced by the fact that radio contact with the Earth abruptly cuts off at the instant I disappear behind the moon, I am alone now, truly alone, and absolutely isolated from any known life. I am it. If a count were taken, the score would be three billion plus two over on the other side of the moon, and one plus God knows what on this side.
Hats off to you Michael Collins! Your quite courage and dignity on the mission in the 40+ years since speak volumes of your character.
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via IFTTT
Happy Birthday, Michael Collins!
While humans have been dreaming of flight since the dawn of time, it wasn’t until the turn of the nineteenth century that the Wright brothers achieved that magical 59 second flight covering 852 feet, skimming over the beach not more than twenty feet off the ground. The new science of flight and aeronautics was born and after thousands of years of dreaming about flight, it only took another two and a half decades to coin the term astronaut (and the related cosmonaut) and set the bar higher for flight. A combination of two Ancient Greek words aster meaning star and nautes meaning a sailor, an astronaut was a sailor of stars.
More than that though, these early pioneers of both space and technology became heroes of popular imagination. They inspired generations of young boys and girls into science and technology and the technology derived from the space program has enriched our everyday lives from breakfast foods to automobile safety.
Today is the birthday (born October 31, 1930) of astronaut Michael Collins, the ‘third’astronaut on the Apollo 11 mission. In the forty plus years since Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to set foot on the moon, Michael Collin’s has been called the loneliest human alive as he waited in the capsule orbiting the lunar surface. Quite the contrary, Collins says:
Far from feeling lonely or abandoned, I feel very much a part of what is taking place on the lunar surface. I know that I would be a liar or a fool if I said that I have the best of the three Apollo 11 seats, but I can say with truth and equanimity that I am perfectly satisfied with the one I have. This venture has been structured for three men, and I consider my third to be as necessary as either of the other two. I don’t mean to deny a feeling of solitude. It is there, reinforced by the fact that radio contact with the Earth abruptly cuts off at the instant I disappear behind the moon, I am alone now, truly alone, and absolutely isolated from any known life. I am it. If a count were taken, the score would be three billion plus two over on the other side of the moon, and one plus God knows what on this side.
Hats off to you Michael Collins! Your quite courage and dignity on the mission in the 40+ years since speak volumes of your character.
from Tumblr http://ift.tt/2efwVim
via IFTTT
