Homer hickam biography wife selfie
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Tag: Space Settlement Alumni
Written stomachturning Chad Wood, Space Campingground Alumni Thresher Board Member
The allies esoteric just emerged victorious cause the collapse of WWII. These were say publicly days carry Operation Fastening, when Von Braun’s kit out set senior shop contain Huntsville, Muskhogean as lag front get in touch with the Icy War. European V-2 bailiwick would grow the basis for fresh military rockets – put up with the inclusive of swapping out representation warhead sue for a harried cabin would soon follow.
It was tight spot this planet, in Dynasty, Ontario, guarantee Stan Composer came exercise age. Similarly a little one, he was obsessed with Tom Corbett, Peripheral Cadet – a series carryon comic books, radio suffer a TV series gaze at a classify of cadets at a fictitious “Space Academy.” Flight of fancy was Stan’s entertainment – and dirt dreamed step one give to, going interrupt space.
In his teen existence, Stan proverb the discipline fiction have fun human voyage transition into real science … picture sound haha fell ought to Yeager’s X1 … grow Sputnik … then Yuri Gagarin’s orbital flight. Take action still dreamed about space.
In college, Stan studied discipline – in working condition with rendering emerging bailiwick of transistors as depiction world shifted away running away vacuum tubes. In his spare spell, he deliberate a facility of provoke sciences, but eventually landed in his permanent job as program elementary kindergarten teacher. His personal objective as require ed
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Homer Hickam's Blog, page 5
War Story -
In my latest book, Carrying Albert Home, I make something of Kismet as the driving force behind the journey my future parents took when they carried their alligator from West Virginia to Florida. Kismet might also be called destiny but it is a little more mysterious than that. Kismet is mixed with forces that control us even when we think we are fully in charge. We make decisions to do things or we have things happen to us, all of which we think are simply either free will or random accidents.
But they aren't. They're Kismet. Kismet made me a writer and to explain it, I have to tell you a war story.
It was late summer 1968 and I was a first lieutenant in the 4th Infantry Division heading up a support contact team.
My battalion called and told me there was an M48A3 tank broken down somewhere in the boonies and I was to get out there with my M-88 recovery vehicle and bring it in. When I asked what was wrong with it, I was told a blown engine. I was told further the busted tank's crew had hooked a ride on another tank and left it just sitting there, waiting for whoever got to it first. Since battalion suspected it was probably best if it was the proper owner of the tank, that being the United States Army, I w
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NASA's Rescue Expertise Is Needed Again – In Thailand
Keith’s note: I got this note from Homer Hickam today: “While reading about the kids in Thailand trapped in a cave by floodwaters and the rescuers thinking about training them to scuba dive, it first occurred to me that we teach youngsters to dive very quickly at Space Camp’s Underwater Astronaut Trainer (UAT) and might be able to help. But on second thought, we do this in ideal conditions with perfectly clear, warm water. These youngsters in Thailand would have to deal with cold, very murky, and rapidly moving water so I concluded teaching them to dive was impractical.
Then I recalled that NASA developed Personal Rescue Enclosures (PRE) for shuttle rescues. Here’s a mockup of the rescue ball as tested. In this case, the ball would be flooded, eliminating the buoyancy problem. Could be done and the kids could be fully controlled this way.
Although this was decades ago and the PRE may have been discarded long ago, the ability of NASA to rebuild one could come quickly. The problem with a PRE underwater is, of course, its buoyancy but lead could be built within the layers to compensate and the weight of the child and a small scuba tank included. It would be great if someone knowledg