Space Travel Question

Mundane Pointless Stuff I Must Share (MPSIMS)
#1

Hi Everyone!

How many Dopers have ever talked (in person), to any person or persons who’ve actually travelled into outer space?
By outer space, I mean anyone who has been on an actual:

(1) Sub-orbital Flight
(2) Earth Orbital Flight
(3) International Space Station
(4) Lunar Mission

Was this person someone that you just had a chance to talk to unexpectedly, or was it during a lecture?

How many Dopers are close relatives to any space travellers?

How many Dopers have actually travelled in space themselves?

#2

I didn’t talk to him but I almost shook David Scott’s (he’s walked on the moon) hand. I could have forced him to shake it but that wouldn’t have been too classy, and I suspect he’s probably tired of shaking hands (he probably did it 50 times that night). It was at the premier of In the Shadow of the Moon at Sundance this year. I was dumbstruck and didn’t say anything to him.

This documentary is fantastic and will be released on September 7, 2007.

#3

I met Buzz Aldrin way back on a trip to the Kennedy Space Center in the mid 70’s.

Right place right time.

Those guys were like gods among men back then.

#4

I used to work for NASA, and know several Shuttle era astronauts.

#5

I was within 20 feet of all of the Apollo astronauts that showed up at EAA for the 25th anniversary of A11. (IIRC all the living ones)

Brian

#6

I was speaking at an event some years ago, and there was also a shuttle astronaut on the bill.

He and I said hellos and then just stood around waiting for our turns on stage. I figured I would be nice, and be (probably) the only person that night not to ask him, “What’s it like to be in space?” So I didn’t engage him in conversation.

This was about two years before I became a space and aviation buff. :smack:

#7

I met Jim Lovell at a booksigning when his book Lost Moon came out, and I have eaten at his resaurant in Lake Forest, I don’t think he was there at the time, though.