Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper
| Biology |
|  | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Environment | ||||||
| Society | ||||||
| Technology |
| |||||
Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Diver |
| Space career | |
| Astronaut | |
| Rank | Captain, USN |
Time in space | 11d 19h 06m |
| Selection | 1996 NASA Group |
| Missions | STS-115, STS-126 |
Mission insignia |   |
Heidemarie Martha Stefanyshyn-Piper (born February 7, 1963 in St. Paul, Minnesota) is an American Naval officer and a NASA astronaut.
Early life and education
Of Ukrainian-American heritage, Stefanyshyn-Piper graduated in 1980 from what was then the all-girls Derham Hall High School in St. Paul, Minnesota, and holds Bachelor of Science (1984) and Master's (1985) degrees in mechanical engineering from MIT. She is a licensed Amateur radio operator (ham) with Technician License KD5TVR.
Military career
Stefanyshyn-Piper is a Captain in the United States Navy.
NASA career
STS-115
Stefanyshyn-Piper flew her first mission on STS-115 (launched on September 9, 2006, returned September 21, 2006), as a Mission Specialist and became only the 8th woman to perform a spacewalk (out of 156 total spacewalkers).
Stefanyshyn-Piper's two EVAs for a total of 12 hours, 8 minutes made her the second most experienced female spacewalker. She also became the first Minnesotan woman to go into space.[1][2][3][4]
On September 22, 2006, Stefanyshyn-Piper collapsed twice during a welcome-home ceremony with family and friends. She had "a couple of small dizzy spells" while speaking during the ceremony at Ellington Field in Houston. A flight surgeon examined Stefanyshyn-Piper, 43, and said she was fine, but still making the readjustment to Earth's gravity from the weightlessness of space.
STS-126
Piper is currently flying as a Mission Specialist on STS-126 where she is scheduled to take part in three spacewalks.
Tool bag lost during spacewalk
During the first EVA of STS-126 on November 18, 2008 as Piper was preparing to begin work on the SARJ, she noticed a significant amount of grease in her tool bag, "I think we had a grease gun explode in the large bag, because there's grease in the bag," Piper reported to Kimbrough, who was working inside the shuttle to help coordinate the EVA.[5][6] Mission Control managers instructed her to clean up the grease using a dry wipe. During the cleanup attempt, Piper apparently lost grip of the bag. "I guess one of my crew lock bags was not transferred and it's loose," Piper told Kimbrough.[5] The bag floated aft and starboard of the station, and did not pose a risk to the station or orbiter. The bag and its contents have now entered Low Earth Orbit as space debris.
After taking an inventory of the items inside the lost bag, managers on the ground determined that Bowen had all those items in his bag, and the two could share equipment.[5] While it extended the EVA duration slightly, the major objectives were not changed.[6][5]
References
- ^ NASA biography
- ^ Spacefacts biography of Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper
- ^ QRZ.com Ham License information for Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper
- ^ Story: Five Radio Amateurs Now Aboard ISS
- ^ a b c d William Harwood for CBS News (2008). "Bag of tools escapes from spacewalker and floats away". Spaceflightnow.com.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|accessmonthday=ignored (help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help) - ^ a b NASA RSS (2008). "Astronauts Resume Spacewalk After Tools Lost". NASA.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|accessmonthday=ignored (help); Unknown parameter|accessyear=ignored (|access-date=suggested) (help)
  | This biographical article related to the United States Navy is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
.jpg){kind=small} | This article about an astronaut is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |