The first Hispanic woman to go into space says we have made progress in encouraging women and minorities to enter science, but more needs to be done.
“I think it’s still the case that in our culture, if you ask someone to say a picture of a scientist or an engineer, that picture still looks like a white man,” said Dr. Ellen Ochoa told Yahoo Finance Presets: Hispanic Stars
The former astronaut said, “From the get-go, I think girls, and especially Latinas, don’t show themselves from a young age.”
Ochoa spent 30 years at NASA and was the first Hispanic to serve as director of the Johnson Space Center in Houston. It credits most of the agency’s work 15 years ago to the beginning of a marriage between today and present private and public space efforts.
“We knew we had a few years left to make the space shuttle available, and we wanted to see what companies could come up with to provide NASA services, which, of course, was a very different model than ours. ‘It was before,’ he said.
“So now we’ve seen both SpaceX and Northrop Grumman (NOC) cargo vehicles move forward for several years, and you know the work has been done towards the crew for the last five or six years.”
This year was the first time astronauts were launched from American soil since the space shuttle program retired almost a decade ago. The launch on May 30, 2020 was a collaboration between Elon Musk’s SpaceX and NASA.
“I’m very excited to see a very successful mission that recently ended with Doug Hurley and Bob Behkenken,” he said of the launch.
NASA astronaut Robert Behkenken gave viewers a thumbs up as he boarded a plane at the Naval Air Station Pensacola, and hours after NASA astronaut Douglas Hurley returned to Houston, the SpaceX Crew Dragon Andrew spacecraft arrived from the shores of Pensacola. , Fla., Sunday, Aug 2, 2020. The Demo-2 test flight for NASA’s Commercial Crew program was the first to take astronauts to the International Space Station and return them safely to Earth on a commercially built and operated spacecraft. Behanken and Hurley returned after spending 64 days in space. (AP by Bill Engels / NASA)
With space initiatives running for billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, Ochoa is everything to him.
“I definitely think ideas can come from anywhere. If you really get people involved in launching, there is the right amount of infrastructure and engineering and manufacturing, and funding is coming from somewhere, ”he said.
“I think now you look at the space landscape – and think beyond just the human spaceflight, but other companies that are developing other launch vehicles … there’s a lot going on. And I think investors are very excited about being part of that industry now, ”he said.
Ochoa says she has barely witnessed Earth from space in the space of four missions, and that has shaped the way she sees the world.
The former astronaut said, “You’ll really see it as the endless connection of everyone around the planet, connected.”
His team spent hours studying the Earth’s atmosphere.
“You spent a lot of time looking at the curve of the earth and seeing the thin layer of atmosphere that makes it seem so thin and fragile compared to the size of the earth,” he said.
“You know, he’s the one who keeps us all alive. We really need to understand what the environment is all about and what we as human beings should do to ensure that we continue to support life, ”he said.
To achieve the big goal of going to Mars, Ochoa said a commitment to infrastructure is needed.
“It’s not just people coming back and forth,” he said.
“Keeping them alive while they’re on the surface and creating a situation where they can partially live off the resources available on Mars and understanding the whole logistics, medical care, just everything that goes with it,” she said.
“It’s an exciting challenge, and I’m sure we’ve seen it, probably in the 2030s.”
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