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Author
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Topic: Nicollier in Atlanta
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sikotic19
Member Posts: 80
From: Chattanooga, TN, USA
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted 03-05-2005 03:54 AM
   
I had the pleasure of seeing a presentation by ESA astronaut Claude Nicollier last night at the Fernbank Planetarium in Atlanta. After driving down from Chattanooga and hitting the lovely rush hour traffic I arrived just 15 minutes before the start of the show. The presentation was given in a large circular room with projections from a computer that shows on the ceiling in two places so everyone could see easily.
Mr. Nicollier was introduced by the director of the Alliance Francaise, which was a co-sponsor of the event. Mr. Nicollier then went on to explain that the event was supposed to have been a gathering of French speaking astronauts, and he went on to name several including Julie Payette, Michel Tognini and Frank DeWinne along with several others and how one by one everyone else who was supposed to attend slowly dropped out until he was the only left. This got a good laugh out of the crowd, which were probably about a hundred people all together.
His presentation took a little over an hour and was very interesting. He started out talking about the launch and landing of the shuttle and his impressions during those parts of the missions. Then he went on to the Hubble telescope and his work on two servicing missions. He also talked some about life aboard ISS, which he says he still hopes to get a chance to visit. And then he ended the talk with the future of NASA and his personal hope to have someone on Mars by 2030. Throughout the presentation he was showing some of the most beautiful photos, some of them taken by Hubble and others were EVA photos of pictures of the earth. One particular photo showed the entire Himalayan mountain chain and the Bermuda islands was another particularly stunning one.
His presentation took longer than expected and another show was about to start so he cut out the question and answer session afterward, but he went to a table in the front hall and sat and signed autographs and talked with people for the next hour or two. After getting two autographs myself I wandered around some of the displays in the planetarium and discovered to my amazement that they have the Apollo 6 command module on display. Unfortunately the batteries in my camera died, so I only got a few pictures.
http://images5.theimagehosting.com/P3040004.1.jpg
http://images5.theimagehosting.com/P3040001.1.jpg
http://images5.theimagehosting.com/P3040007.1.jpg All in all it was a great evening and I want to thank Robert Pearlman, as once again, without Collectspace, I would have never known about it. Regards, Geoff
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James Brown
Member Posts: 1287
From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted 03-05-2005 07:04 AM
I was there too. He gave a great presentation, and was very accommodating afterwards with autographs. I scored 5 myself. James |
sikotic19
Member Posts: 80
From: Chattanooga, TN, USA
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted 03-09-2005 12:10 AM
James,I sat in the same row as two guys who were each carrying a 20th anniversary space shuttle book. Were you one of them? If so, what was the other thing you were carrying? I saw Mr. Nicollier sign it but I couldn't hear what was being said. Regards,
Geoff |
James Brown
Member Posts: 1287
From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted 03-09-2005 06:36 AM
Yep, that was me. I was with my friend Joel, who was carrying a book for someone. The "thing" I had was a SRB bracket, just like the one Robert highlights under his hardware section. I would have introduced myself had I known anyone else from CS was there. James | |
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