(Mike Tofanelli/illustration)
Astronaut down to Earth about shuttle mission
(Reprinted from Dateline, 10.17.97)
UC Davis' first astronaut, Stephen Robinson, returned to campus this week to the sounds of warm applause and boisterous Cal Aggie Band-uh music.
On his first trip to California since his August shuttle voyage, Robinson visited his alma mater to bring back some souvenirs and show a travel slide show like few others.
Before a speech to the Staff Assembly on Tuesday, Robinson presented Chancellor Larry Vanderhoef with a "very high mileage issue" of the California Aggie newspaper.
Returns mementos from space
Robinson said the June 5 paper, which carried a front-page feature about him, flew 189 times around the planet aboard the Discovery space shuttle at altitudes of up to 168 miles above Earth. The issue also bears the signatures of Robinson and the five other crew members of shuttle mission No. 85.
On Wednesday, Robinson was scheduled to return a distinguished alumni medal to the College of Engineering during a similar presentation. Robinson had asked for campus mementos to take along for his ride.
‘The sky isn't black. It's this tremendous deep nothingness. I don't think I can explain it.’
Astronaut Steve Robinson
Robinson, who graduated from UC Davis in 1978 with a bachelor's degree in aeronautical and mechanical engineering, said he was moved by the sight of the campus when he arrived this week.
"It's really exciting for me to be back here at UC Davis," he told a standing-room-only crowd at the Staff Assembly fall meeting at the Buehler Alumni and Visitors Center's AGR Hall. The audience responded with a standing ovation after his talk.
Crew-made video of shuttle trip
Robinson showed slides and a crew-made video tape of the 12-day shuttle trip, talking about the crew's scientific missions, life aboard the shuttle and views from space.
Robinson was part of a crew that released, followed and recaptured a satellite that collected data on the Earth's ozone layer. He also helped test robotic arms for use on the planned international space station and took pictures of Comet Hale-Bopp with an ultraviolet telescope.
The crew took more than 3,000 photographs from the shuttle. Among those Robinson showed to campus audiences were the aurora australis (or "southern lights"), a dust storm in China, fishing boats off Cape Cod and the "Barney footprint" shape of Lake Tahoe.
"When I find one that has Davis in it, it will show up here, I promise," he said.
Lack of gravity affects body, sleeping, eating
He described how astronaut's faces get puffy and muscles get weak without the pull of gravity. He said it took him about three days to get used to sleeping adrift in the shuttle, tucked in a bed like a sleeping bag with sleeves "so you don't slip out like a hotdog," with his hands floating above his face.
The crew members also learned one pitfall of trying to eat a curry-chicken dinner in space--"rice satellites" that end up in their hair. "We now know for a fact why people don't eat rice with chopsticks in space."
Take-off was a "big jolt," with the G-forces pressing on him like "two people sitting on your chest."
Wild ride for an 'exhilaration junkie'
"It was quite a ride, especially for an exhilaration junkie like me," he said. "The experience of speed is just overwhelming."
At about 60 miles out, he saw the Earth from space. "My first view out the window is something I will never forget.
"The sky isn't black," he said. "It's this tremendous, deep nothingness. I don't think I can explain it."
From space, Robinson said, the Earth's atmosphere looks like a thin, blue "fringe."
"I think we all came back realizing how fragile that is," he said. "And it really is."