Print

[Bruce Thomas]

A Soyuz capsule arrived at the International Space Station yesterday, delivering two Americans and one Russian to take up residence there.  Checking out the news on the website of the German news magazine "Der Spiegel" just now, I was surprised to find this bit of info in the middle of the story:     

Shannon Walker, eine begeisterte Privatpilotin, ist zwar Kosmosneuling, setzt aber eine Familientradition fort. Denn ihr Mann ist ebenfalls Astronaut: Er war zwischen 1996 und 2005 viermal im All, davon dreimal in der ISS. Walker brachte auf ihrer ersten Tour ins All auch die Uhr der Luftfahrt-Pionierin Amelia Earhart mit zur ISS.

In English: 

Shannon Walker, an avid private pilot, is a newcomer to space, but is continuing a family tradition.  That's because her husband [Andrew Thomas] is also an astronaut:  he traveled in space four times between 1996 and 2005, three of those times to the ISS.  Walker has brought with her on her first flight to the ISS the wristwatch of aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart.

Checkout another news source for more on this (including a picture of the watch) at http://www.collectspace.com/news/news-061710a.html. 

It's not the first Amelia artifact to fly in outer space.  Last fall one of her scarves flew on the space shuttle (for the second time!).  An interesting story in Air & Space magazine describes the scarf (and more) at http://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/Amelias-Astronaut-Connection.html.

Now if Ric and the rest of the Tighar crew could just find Amelia's other wristwatch on Niku!   

[Ashley Such]

Thanks for the links; they were interesting reads. So sweet of these people to remember her like that... Taking her watch and lucky scarf up to space.