Dream Big - Space, Limerick and Two Men's Quests to Reach for the Stars

by Cian O'Regan

Crowds of excited space enthusiasts descended on the Limerick Institute of Technology's Millennium Theatre on Wednesday evening, to hear from Apollo 15 Command Module Pilot Al Worden, and Limerick's very own Space Tourist Cyril Bennis.

Moderated by the brilliant Dr Niamh Shaw, the evening began when the two special guests were both asked what made them decide they wanted to dedicate their lives to space exploration.

Most Al Worden stories finish with whooping laughter, as seen here!
credit: Irish Space Blog(Cian O'Regan)

Worden was able to trace this all the way back to his humble beginnings growing up on a farm in Michigan, when he discovered that a life spent working the land simply wasn't for him;

"I made the decision, albeit at an early age, that I wanted to get as far away from the farm as possible."

Little would this farm boy know that years later he would travel a quarter of a million miles to the Moon to fulfill this promise.

With the full support and backing of his parents, Worden decided to follow the theme of the evening and dream big - firmly setting his sights on attending the prestigious United States Military Academy at West Point. However, he soon found out that things weren't going to be that straightforward.

"One big obstacle I had to face was that we didn't have enough money to send me to college," Worden said. "I did all my study at the side, and got myself set for a competitive exam in the state that I lived in, did well enough in that exam to get an appointment from one of the state senators, and that got me into West Point..

All I had to do was keep my nose clean, nose to the grindstone, shine my shoes, make sure my clothes were neatly folded in the closet, get up readily at six o'clock and be out there with the rest of them, do what I had to do, and I found out that I did okay!"

The twenty-three year old Worden graduated from the USMA as a member of the class of 1955, and thanks to a number of senior Air Force officers at the Academy, decided that flying aeroplanes would be his next big move.

"I found out that I had a knack for flying - it was almost second nature."

Having earned his Air Force wings, Worden decided that flying aircraft higher and faster than anyone else was what he wanted to do next. For any pilot with such lofty aspirations, Edwards Air Force Base in the high-desert of California - the kindergarten for astronauts - was the next logical step.

Following in the footsteps of some of America's first space explorers at Edwards(Gus Grissom, Frank Borman, Tom Stafford and Ed White to name just a few), and after spending time at the Empire Test Pilot School in Farnborough, England, Worden was selected as part of NASA's fifth group of astronauts in April 1966.

Cyril Bennis was just a young secondary-school student when John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth aboard his Friendship 7 spacecraft in 1962. A school visit by Glenn on a post-flight goodwill tour to Limerick was the source of inspiration for a young Bennis to reach for the stars.

"At that moment I thought that this is what I want to achieve in my life" said the former mayor of Stratford-upon-Avon in England. "I believe that absolutely everyone has a potential to do something great, and that something great for me I hope is to fly in space."

Like Al Worden, Bennis had the full backing of his parents to pursue a career in space, in particular from his mother.

"I would spend a lot of my time in school dreaming, dreaming of places I wanted to go..
My mother always used to say that I needed a rocket under me to get me going, well now when I make my flight - I'll have four under me!"

Widely tipped to become the first Irish citizen to fly in space. Bennis is due to make two flights with XCOR Space Expeditions. On his first flight, Bennis will zoom to the edge of space - 60 kilometers above the Earth aboard the company's Lynx Mark I spacecraft.

Bennis describing his flight profile using a scale model of the XCOR Mark I
credit: Irish Space Blog(Cian O'Regan)

His second flight will be aboard an updated Lynk Mark II, which will take him past the Karman Line(the internationally recognized boundary of suborbital space at an altitude of 100 kilometers), pull 4Gs on the way home, and in the process, become Ireland's first astronaut.

As the night went on, Worden, with NASA and Apollo 15 patches emblazoned on his flight jacket, told stories of his journey to the Moon with the same enthusiasm and excitement as if he had only returned a from the odyssey a few months ago.

As one of the 24 men to have flown to our nearest neighbour, and one of only seven men to have orbited the Moon alone as Command Module Pilot as he did in 1971, you could hear a pin drop as the audience listened intently to tales ranging from launching atop the 363-foot tall Saturn V rocket into space, to what was visible outside the porthole-sized windows of his spaceship Endeavour.

"I had a full panorama of the heavens! Because of the rotation of the spacecraft I would watch the Sun go by, the Moon go by and then the Earth go by." Shaw was quick to ask what goes through a person's mind after seeing something so unique.

"You don't process it much in flight because you're still in awe that you're there.. Those thoughts come to you a couple of weeks after, and you relive what you saw and all those thoughts in your head start to come out."

For Worden, he found the best way express what he saw and felt was through the art of poetry;

"When we got back to Houston, we would get up early and debrief with the whole Mission Control team. Every single second of the flight had to be debriefed, and it took us two weeks to go through all that.

Afterwards I began to have strange thoughts.. I was at home by myself at night, so I'd sit in my living room, turn off all the lights, and these thoughts would come to me. So one day I got a legal pad and I start writing and writing and writing, never really thinking about what I was writing as it was just sort of coming to me. That resulted in a book of poetry!"

Worden discussing his days as a West Point cadet
credit: Irish Space Blog(Cian O'Regan)

Bennis, who has yet to see the Earth from space, told the audience that he'd hopefully be able to answer the same question in the not too distant future.

DREAMING BIG

In their closing remarks, both men focused on the power of aiming high, and stopping at nothing until you've set out what you wanted to achieve in the first place.

"I think it's good to have two feet on the ground and be humble about things" said Limerick man Bennis. "If you dream, you can do these things."

Recalling R-Day(Reception Day - the first day of a cadet at the USMA) at West Point, Worden admitted to feeling way out of his depth.

"I went into West Point that day with something like 850 cadets, and I looked at all those guys and I said to myself "I don't know why I'm here. These guys are so much better than I am. They're the star quarterback on the football team, the straight-A student, the student body president - really great, great guys, and I'm just a little kid off the farm competing with these big city kids."

It took me about three months to figure out that they were no better than I was!

If you want something badly enough, you're going to find a way to do it. You've got to have the dream, the goal, the persistence and the determination to reach that goal, and you'll find that if you can go through life with that kind of attitude, you can do anything you want. Don't ever short-change yourself."

Niamh Shaw, who recently attended Elon Musk's keynote speech at the 67th International Astronomical Congress in Mexico,(an event overshadowed by a straight-up weird Q&A session dominated by over-enthusiastic fans of the billionaire) thankfully did not face such a dilemma as she opened the floor to questions ranging from thoughts on conspiracy theorists to the growth of the commercial spaceflight industry.

Unfortunately all good things must come to an end as the night had to come to a close. Yet with everyone already smiling from ear-to-ear after hearing such wonderful stories and adventures, we couldn't not take a special Space Week group selfie!

On behalf of everyone in attendance that night, I would like to sincerely thank the Blackrock Castle Observatory for organising this fantastic Space Week event in association with LIT and Lough Gur Heritage Centre, and of course offer my sincerest thanks to the superb duo of Al Worden and Cyril Bennis for their stories and inspiration.

Thank you for reading Irish Space Blog!

Be sure to follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Google+

Meeting a Man Who Went to the Moon and Back

On September 16 2014, former NASA astronaut and Apollo 15 Command Module Pilot, Al Worden, gave a lecture in Limerick IT's Millenium Theatre in Limerick City.

The lecture was organised as part of the Share Learn Inspire event in which Worden gave fascinating insights into his early career as an Air Force pilot, as well as his experiences on his voyage to the Moon and back in 1971. The stage was set for a magnificent night, and I think I speak for everyone in attendance in saying that we got value for money for sure!

The doors of the Millenium Theatre in LIT's state of the art campus opened at 6:45 p.m. In an effort to make the most out of this Apollo 15 Astronaut Experience, I arrived there pretty early with my father so that I could get the opportunity to shake the hand and meet the man who guided the Apollo 15 Command Module to the Moon and back.

I had only ever met one astronaut before- when I was lucky enough to interview ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli in Dublin three years ago. However, for some reason, this encounter felt that bit different. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that I was about to have my picture taken with a man who spent three days orbiting the Moon by himself, and the first man conduct a spacewalk, or Extra-Vehicular Activity(EVA) on the journey home from the Moon, forty three years ago. Either way I have to admit I was kind of nervous!

However, these nerves were soon put to rest when Al greeted me and my dad with a great big smile and a handshake- how cool was that! So we had our photos taken. Al was wearing a suit and tie, with the NASA Astronaut Pin stuck onto his blazer. And here I was, wearing a black sports jacket with a space shuttle mission patch stuck onto the chest. In an effort to look as much like a wannabe astronaut as possible, I also brought along my lucky NASA lapel pin for the added touch!

Apollo 15 CMP Al Worden and I before the lecture.

Before the rest of the audience showed up and things got busy, I went back over to Al to ask him a question. At the moment there are divided opinions regarding the next move NASA will take in its efforts to some day fulfill the goal of landing a man on Mars. I asked if he thought going back to the Moon to practice things such as landing, rendezvous and docking, all key elements of a journey to another heavenly body, would be a good idea. He looked up at me, smiled and slowly shook his head. What seemed like a good idea to me, didn't seem like such a good idea to him.

"I think the Moon is nearly acting as an obstacle on our route to Mars", he told me.

I then asked if he thought the International Space Station was providing a sufficient platform that would allow us to take the next step and explore other planets in our solar system. This time thankfully, he agreed! He said the best thing we could do is to turn the space station from the orbiting laboratory it is today, into an inter-planetary gas station, which would certainly make things a whole lot easier for spacecraft making the long journey to the red planet in years to come.

It was fast approaching eight o'clock, and it was time to take our seats.

The lecture kicked off with a short speech from Paul Ryan, founder of the Apollo 15 Experience, and without whom this evening would not have been possible. Paul introduced Dr Norah Patten, Communications and Outreach Manager with the Irish Centre for Composites Research. Norah told us about the links between Ireland and science on the ISS. We learned of the St Nessan's community college in Limerick, and their experiment which flew to the station earlier this year aboard the Orbital Sciences Cygnus cargo craft. The experiment examined the effects of microgravity on reinforced concrete using Irish Cement.

Now for the main event- a speech from Al Worden, Apollo 15 CMP.

Al began by saying what a privilege it was for him to be invited to Ireland, and how impressed he was with the places he had visited during his tour of Limerick.

Worden visiting local schools. credit: broadsheet.ie

Worden described his training as a test pilot, in particular at the Empire Test Pilot's School in Farnborough, England and how it gave him a great launch pad that enabled him to join the astronaut corps in 1966. Al made an effort to get the youngsters in the audience to dream big, by telling them that when he was a kid growing up, there were no such thing as astronauts!

He moved on to describe his voyage into space as the Command Module Pilot for Apollo 15, as well as all the hardships, training, and funny stories that went along with it. He lauded Apollo 15 as man's most daring mission to the Moon, and told his experiences about his own spacewalk to retrieve film from a camera that he got to do while on the way home from the Moon.

He joked that while he was alone in lunar orbit, mission commander Dave Scott and Lunar Module Pilot Jim Irwin explored the surface below, he though about leaving them behind, which was greeted with roars of laughter from the audience. He treated us with fabulous images and video of his mission to the Moon, but there was one image in particular he showed that really had an affect on me personally.

 

Al showed us a magnificent shot of the crescent Earth that he took while in lunar orbit. Here we see just how small and fragile our home planet really is. He put it simply- "That's home."

Of course everyone in the room was amazed by such a photo because it shows the Earth as it really is. Out there in the blackness of space. Alone. I guess it had such an impact on me because here was a man who had seen the fragile oasis on which we live, from a distance of a quarter of a million miles away. I'm sure I wasn't the only one in the audience who felt that extra sense of responsibility for taking care of our planet that bit more. You can see what Al had to say about the matter for himself in the above video.

The Apollo 15 mission was a success in every sense of the word. The only failure being that one of the three parachutes didn't deploy after atmospheric re-entry(This didn't make any real difference, because the CM was designed to be able to land with only two chutes), and also the fact that Al couldn't grow much of a beard, having spent two weeks in space!

The event came to a close when Al answered a few audience questions on the subject of the Apollo 1 fire, the Space Shuttle as well as the future of the manned space programme. 

On behalf of everyone in attendance that night, I would like to sincerely thank Paul Ryan, organiser of this magnificent event, Dr Norah Patten of ICOMP, and of course, Mr Al Worden, for coming to Ireland to tell his stories of his adventure to the Moon.

On a sidenote

I had learned about a week before the event at LIT, that ESA astronaut Leopold Eyharts was coming to Dublin to give a lecture in Dublin's Science Gallery. What a shame that the two events were on the same day! I guess astronauts coming to Ireland are like buses. They rarely come along, and then two show up at the exact same time!

Thank you for reading Irish Space Blog!