HISTORY OF KALPANA CHAWLA

KALPANA CHAWLA
Kalpana Chawla (July 1, 1961 February 1, 2003) was an IndianAmerican astronaut who, was a mission specialist on the space shuttle Columbia. She first flew on the Columbia in 1997 as a mission specialist and primary robotic arm operator. Chawla was one of seven crew members killed in theSpace Shuttle Columbia disaster.

EARLY LIFE:
Kalpana Chawla was born to a Hindu family in Karnal, Haryana, India on 1 July 1961 to Banarasi Lal Chawla and Sanjyothi. She had two sisters, Sunita and Deepa, and a brother, Sanjay. She became a US citizen in 1990. She was the youngest of four siblings in the family

EDUCATION:

Chawla completed her earlier schooling at Tagore Public School, Karnal and her Bachelor of Engineering degree in Aeronautical Engineering at Punjab Engineering College at Chandigarh in 1982. She moved to the United States in 1982 and obtained a M.S. degree in aerospace engineering from theUniversity of Texas at Arlington in 1984. Chawla went on to earn a second M.S. degree in 1986 and a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering in 1988 from theUniversity of Colorado at Boulder. Later that year she began working at the NASA Ames Research Center as vice president of Overset Methods, Inc. where she did CFD research on Vertical/Short Takeoff and Landing concepts. Chawla held a Certificated Flight Instructor rating for airplanes, gliders and Commercial Pilot licenses for single and multi-engine airplanes, seaplanes and gliders

NASA CAREER:
Chawla joined the NASA 'Astronaut Corps' in March 1995 and was selected for her first flight in 1996. She spoke the following words while traveling in the weightlessness of space, "You are just your intelligence". She had traveled 10.4 million km, as many as 252 times around the Earth. Her first space mission began on November 19, 1997 as part of the six-astronaut crew that flew the Space Shuttle Columbia flight STS-87. Chawla was the first Indian-born woman and the second Indian person to fly in space, following cosmonaut Rakesh Sharma who flew in 1984 in a spacecraft. On her first mission Chawla traveled over 10.4 million miles in 252 orbits of the earth, logging more than 372 hours in space. During STS-87, she was responsible for deploying the Spartan Satellite which malfunctioned, necessitating a spacewalk by Winston Scott and Takao Doi to capture the satellite. A five-month NASA investigation fully exonerated Chawla by identifying errors in software interfaces and the defined procedures of flight crew and ground control. After the completion of STS-87 post-flight activities, Chawla was assigned to technical positions in the astronaut office to work on the space station, her performance in which was recognized with a special award from her peers. In 2000 she was selected for her second flight as part of the crew of STS-107. This mission was repeatedly delayed due to scheduling conflicts and technical problems such as the July 2002 discovery of cracks in the shuttle engine flow liners. On January 16, 2003, Chawla finally returned to space aboard Columbia on the illfated STS-107 mission. Chawla's responsibilities included the microgravity experiments, for which the crew conducted nearly 80 experiments studying earth and space science, advanced technology development, and astronaut health and safety.

DEATH:
Chawla died in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster which occurred on February 1, 2003, when the Space Shuttle disintegrated over Texas during re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere, with the loss of all seven crew members, shortly before it was scheduled to conclude its 28th mission, STS-107.

AWARDS:
Posthumously awarded:

Congressional Space Medal of Honor NASA Space Flight Medal NASA Distinguished Service Medal

KALPANA CHAWLA BIOGRAPHY:

Kalpana Chawla's path to become an astronaut began in Karnal, India. "None of our astronauts traveled a longer path to space than Kalpana Chawla," U.S. President George W. Bush said. "She left India as a student but she would see the nation of her birth, all of it, from hundreds of miles above." Chawla knew that she wanted to be an aerospace engineer at an early age. She was influenced by watching the planes from the local flying clubs and by her father. "Every once in a while," Chawla said, "we'd ask my dad if we could get a ride in one of these planes. And, he did take us to the flying club and get us a ride in the Pushpak and a glider that the flying club had." She graduated from Tagore School, Karnal, India, in 1976 and received a bachelor's degree in aeronautical engineering from India's Punjab Engineering College in 1982. Then, she moved to the United States to go to graduate school at the University of Texas-Arlington, where she received a master's degree in aerospace engineering in 1984. Then, she moved to Boulder, Colo., to pursue a doctorate in aerospace engineering, which she received in 1988. Her career with NASA began in 1988 when she went to work for the Ames Research Center in California. Chawla's work at Ames centered on powered-lift computational fluid dynamics, which involves aircraft like the Harrier.

She left Ames in 1993 to join Overset Methods Inc. in Los Altos, Calif., as vice president and research scientist. She headed a team of researchers specializing in simulation of moving multiple body problems. Her work at Overset resulted in development and implementation of efficient techniques to perform aerodynamic optimization. However, the successful career outside of NASA was brief. The agency selected her as an astronaut candidate in December 1994, and she reported to Johnson Space Center in March 1995. Her first flight was STS-87, the fourth U.S Microgravity Payload flight, on Space Shuttle Columbia from Nov. 19 to Dec. 5, 1997. She was a mission specialist and operated Columbia's robot arm. She returned to space in Jan. 16, 2003, aboard Columbia. She served as mission specialist during the 16-day research flight. The STS-107 crew conducted more than 80 experiments. Chawla and her six STS-107 crewmates perished Feb. 1, 2003, over Texas as Columbia was re-entering Earth's atmosphere en route to a landing at Kennedy Space Center, Fla. Chawla is survived by her husband. Her interests included hiking and backpacking. She also enjoyed flying. She held a Certificated Flight Instructor's license with airplane and glider ratings, Commercial Pilot's licenses for single- and multiengine land and seaplanes, and Gliders, and instrument rating for airplanes. In a memorial service on Feb. 4, 2003, Astronaut Office Chief Kent Rominger said that Chawla loved her work and was respected by her colleagues. "Kalpana, or K.C. to her friends, was admired personally for her extraordinary kindness and technically for her strive for perfection," he said. "She had a terrific sense of humor and loved flying small airplanes with her husband and loved flying in space. Flying was her passion. She would often remind her crew as her training flow would be delayed and become extended, she would say, 'Man, you are training to fly in space. What more could you want?'"

During an STS-107 preflight interview, she was asked who inspired her. She responded that she was motivated by people who are giving it their all. "I think inspiration and tied with it is motivation," she said. "For me, definitely, it comes every day from people in all walks of life. It's easy for me to be motivated and inspired by seeing somebody who just goes all out to do something." Chawla was a motivated person who made an impression on others. "When the sad news reached her hometown," Bush said, "an administrator at her high school recalled, 'She always said she wanted to reach the stars. She went there and beyond.' Kalpana's native country mourns her today and so does her adopted land."

KALPANA CHAWLA KILLED IN COLUMBIA CRASH:

WASHINGTON: US space shuttle Columbia disintegrated shortly before landing on Saturday morning, killing the seven crew members on board, including IndianAmerican Kalpana Chawla. Witnesses in and near Waco and Dallas, Texas, reported seeing the space shuttle breaking up around 8 am local time, about 16 minutes before its scheduled landing at Cape Caneveral, Florida. Local cameramen captured several vapour trails in a clear blue sky as the shuttle broke up. Columbia was returning to earth after a 16-day mission and was commanded by Texan Rick Husband, who was on his second mission. It was also the second mission for Karnal, Haryana-born Kalpana Chawla after her debut flight in 1997. In fact, it was possibly the most diverse space mission ever. Besides Husband and Chawla, the shuttle carried African-American Michael Anderson, Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon, and woman doctor Laurel Clark. About an hour after the shuttle was seen disintegrating, witnesses reported seeing debris scattering in the Texas hinterland between several small remote towns.

Nasa mission control said the flight was at 200,000 feet altitude and traveling at 12,500 miles an hour when they lost contact after a last garbled message. At that time, the seven astronauts would have been strapped in for landing and tremendous gravitational force would have been at work. This was Columbia's 28th space flight. Each shuttle is good for at least 100 flights. Columbia was returning to the earth after a 16-day space mission in which the crew carried out nearly 80 experiments. Chawla was the shuttle's flight engineer and was also tasked to carry out several scientific experiments. Columbia's landing was happening just after the 17th anniversary of the Challenger disaster (January 28, 1986) in which seven American astronauts died when the shuttle exploded shortly after take-off. Although Chawla was married (to Frenchman Jean Pierre Harrison, a flying instructor and aviation writer) and settled in the US, she had close ties to India. In fact, among the items she carried into space on this mission was a banner from the Nehru Planetarium in India, one from the Aero Club of India, and pins and patches from some of the schools and colleges she attended both in India and the United States. Chawla showed an interest in flying and space from her earlier years growing up in Karnal, Haryana. Her school projects and papers were all about the stars, planets, and outer space. Her businessman father encouraged her to join the Karnal Flying Club, while she took up engineering and became Punjab Engineering College's first woman aeronautical engineer in 1982. She moved to the US soon after for her graduate and post-graduate studies and joined Nasa's Ames Space Center in 1987. She was selected by Nasa in 1994 to be an astronaut.