Kalpana Chawla
"Do something because you really want to do it. If you're doing it just for the goal, and don't enjoy the path, then I think you're cheating yourself" - Kalpana Chawla.
Kalpana Chawla was an Indian-American astronaut and space shuttle mission specialist. She was one of the seven crew members tragically killed in the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster.
Born in Karnal, India, in the year 1961, she was the youngest of the four children. From her earliest childhood, Kalpana and her brother shared an interest in flying. Kalpana's father would take the two siblings to the flying club where the sight of the airplanes from the first mail flights of J.R.D Tata quite intrigued Kalpana and captivated her imagination.
When she announced to her father that she wanted to study aerospace engineering, he suggested that she should get into something more respectable like studying to be a doctor or a teacher. Undeterred by others' opinions, Kalpana received a bachelor's degree, two master's degrees, and finally a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from the University of Colorado.
Her association with NASA subsequently took shape. She started her career at the NASA Ames Research Center in the San Francisco Bay area studying powered-lift computational fluid dynamics. The focus of her research was the stimulation of complex air flows encountered around spacecraft. Next, she began charting flow solvers to parallel computers, and testing these solvers by carrying out powered lift computations in support of her research.
In 1994, Kalpana surprised her colleagues by joining a team of 2,000 astronaut candidates. She reported to the Johnson Space Center in Texas in March 1995, a candidate in the 15th group of astronauts. Only five-feet tall and weighing only 90 pounds, the challenge for Chawla was having her feet reach the pedals of the Pitts X2-B airplane.
Her first flight into space on November 19, 1997, was on the STS-87. The focal point of its experiments were designed to study how the weightless environment of space affects various physical processes and on observations of the Sun's outer atmospheric layers. Before returning to earth on December 5, the spacecraft made 252 orbits, travelling 6.5 million miles in 376 hours and 34 minutes.
When the space squadron for the Columbia STS-107 was chosen, the team underwent rigorous training for their adventure in space that took-off on January 16, 2003. It was set to return on February 1, 2003. Kalpana was thrilled about her second trip and had sent an e-mail to a friend from space saying that having the chance at another trip was "like having a wonderful dream again." When the shuttle tragically blew apart just 16 minutes before landing, Kalpana went on to become a historical figure, and left many behind to praise her spirit and her ambition.
She has been posthumously awarded; the NASA Space Flight Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, the Defense Distinguished Service Medal (DDSM), and the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. In memory of Kalpana and her achievements in aerospace engineering, the meteorological series of satellites, "METSAT", were renamed as "KALPANA".
Kalpana died a hero and a role model for many young women, especially in India and particularly those in her hometown of Karnal. Her endeavours have left a mark for youngsters to tread her path. Despite her absence in this world, she is a star up there in the sky; in other words, an eternal soul.
DISCLAIMER: The contents in this article was collected through sources on the Internet.
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