Posts Tagged astronauts
Christmas in January
Posted by Danielle in Children's Items, Picspam on January 26, 2012
Yeah, yeah, it’s a little late for Christmas, but these images are too terrific to wait eleven months to post, I’m sorry! (Hat tip to Rachel Hobson for the find!)
Heh heh, Santa goes out on a LM… (limb! Get it? GET IT?? HAHAHA… okay I’ll shut up now.)
21st Century Rockwell
An interesting, Norman Rockwell-esque encounter with alien life from 1955. Image courtesy of x-ray delta one.
Before Liftoff
The colors and lighting in this illustration by James Bama are just gorgeous. Created for a book cover in 1964, Countdown for Cindy by Eloise Engle. “The thrilling story of Nurse McGee’s mercy mission to a space station on the moon.” (Thanks to @susanjsteward for the detective work!)
Image via x-ray delta one.
Bean on the Moon
I’ve always loved this photo. There’s something a little ethereal about it. Alan Bean gets double points in my book for being a moon-walker/artist.
Astronaut Alan L. Bean, Lunar Module pilot, pauses near a tool carrier during the Apollo 12 spacewalk on the moon’s surface. Commander Charles Conrad, Jr., who took the black-and-white photo, is reflected in Bean’s helmet visor.
Image Credit: NASA
Grissom and Young
Posted by Danielle in Art & Architecture on July 5, 2011

Grissom and Young, by Norman Rockwell, 1965, Oil on canvas. Courtesy Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. Licensed by Norman Rockwell Licensing, Niles, IL.
A beautifully-detailed work by Norman Rockwell, a snapshot of the crew preparations before the first Gemini mission. Rockwell is a master of capturing the “moment”, in my opinion – those little spaces of time that happen in the course of greater things. He paints people being… people. Even astronauts are people.
Astronauts John Young and Gus Grissom are suited for the first flight of the Gemini program in March 1965. NASA loaned Norman Rockwell a Gemini spacesuit in order to make this painting as accurate as possible.
This work is on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Mall building from May 28 to Oct. 9, 2011, as part of the NASA | Art: 50 Years of Exploration exhibition.
Hey! I know that guy!
Posted by Danielle in Perspectives, Picspam on April 5, 2011
It’s a funny feeling, following a spaceflight launch where you’ve seen one of the crew in person. Astronaut Ron Garan (@Astro_Ron) spoke at the first STS-133 Tweetup on November 1, 2010, and yesterday he launched into orbit as part of the Expedition 27 crew of the International Space Station. He sure looks happy to go! (He’s in the middle, in the above photo.)
Expedition 27 crew members from top, Russian Flight Engineer Andrey Borisenko, NASA Flight Engineer Ron Garan, and Soyuz Commander Alexander Samokutyaev wave farewell from the bottom of the Soyuz rocket prior to their launch to the International Space Station from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Baikonur, Kazakhstan, on Tuesday, April 5, 2011.
The Soyuz, which has been dubbed “Gagarin,” is launching one week shy of the 50th anniversary of the launch of Yuri Gagarin from the same launch pad in Baikonur on April 12, 1961, to become the first human to fly in space.
Hey @Astro_Ron! There’s someone special waiting for you on the ISS, ready to serve your every need – a sleek, attractive feat of modern technology:

……..whoops! Wrong picture. Here you go:
Enjoy!
The Human Element
Posted by Danielle in Perspectives, Picspam on March 16, 2011
I think sometimes it’s easy to look at all these wonderful launch pictures and spacecraft pictures and forget that there’s people inside. It’s interesting (and somewhat rare) when you can see the craft and the people, as is the case if you zoom into the above photo:
@Astro_Nicole posted another pic similar to this — very cute!
Godspeed Columbia
Posted by Danielle in Perspectives, Picspam on February 1, 2011

I was just young enough that I don’t really remember Challenger. This is the one I remember very clearly. I wrote about it last year, if you’re interested.
STS-1, Columbia’s maiden voyage, launched on April 12, 1981, and was the inaugural flight in the Space Shuttle Program. Columbia and its crew were lost during STS-107 mission in 2003. As the shuttle lifted off from Kennedy Space Center on Jan. 16, a small portion of foam broke away from the external fuel tank and struck the orbiter’s left wing. The resulting damage created a hole in the wing’s leading edge, which caused the vehicle to break apart during reentry on Feb. 1.
Image Credit: NASA
Eight years later…. Godspeed, Columbia.

The STS-107 crewmembers pose for their traditional in-flight crew portrait aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia. From the left (bottom row) are astronauts Kalpana Chawla, mission specialist; Rick D. Husband, mission commander; Laurel B. Clark, mission specialist; and Ilan Ramon, payload specialist. From the left (top row) are astronauts David M. Brown, mission specialist; William C. McCool, pilot; and Michael P. Anderson, payload commander. Credit: NASA
Day of Remembrance 2011
January 27, 1967 — Apollo 1
Grissom • White • Chaffee
January 28, 1986 — Challenger/STS-51L
Scobee • Smith • Resnik • Onizuka
McNair • Jarvis • McAuliffe
February 1, 2003 — Columbia/STS-107
Husband • McCool • Anderson • Brown
Chawla • Clark • Ramon












This blog celebrates space exploration, human spaceflight and the heavens, through
My name is Danielle Signor, and I am a space cadet. 









