Super Saturday

ASTRO AFTERNOON: Saturday, we made our way to one of our favorite places, The Museum of Flight. The main attraction: Astronaut Dr. Michael Barratt. We'd never met him before, and were excited to learn more about him. Every single astronaut we've had the pleasure of being around has been so interesting. Dr. Barratt was no exception. 

I'll let CJ tell you a bit more about Dr. Barratt. His account starts immediately below ... 

Over the years, I have been to several presentations and events featuring astronauts, primarily at places like the Museum of Flight in south Seattle. Today, I went to the Museum of Flight to see a presentation by Dr. Michael R. Barratt, a Washington native and astronaut, aboard the Soyuz TMA-14 in 2009, as well as the Space Shuttle Discovery in 2011. According to the Museum of Flight's website, Dr. Barratt now serves in NASA’s International Space Station Operations and Integration branches to handle medical issues and on orbit support.

Dr. Barratt was born in Vancouver, Washington, and spent most of his childhood on a farm on the outskirts of Camas, located in southern Washington. 

While most Americans assume that most people will spend about 4 years in college, from ages 18 to 22, Dr. Barratt actually spent 14 years in college, longer than my lifetime so far. According to his official biography from the NASA website, he graduated from:

• University of Washington, 1977-1981
• Northwestern University, 1981-1985, 1988
• Veterans Administration Lakeside Hospital, 1989
• Wright State University, 1991

Apparently, his extended (not in a bad way at all) education got to a point where Donna Baratt (Dr. Barratt's mother) was worried if her son would ever get a job. According to NASA's website, Dr. Barratt's first experience with NASA was coming to NASA JSC in May 1991, employed as a project physician with KRUG Life Sciences, while working on medical systems for Space Station Freedom. In 2000, Dr. Barratt was selected to be an astronaut, though he would not go on his first mission for nearly a decade later, in 2009. According to him, it normally would've been six years, but the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster delayed further flights for three years.

After the end of Dr. Barratt's presentation, he began to take questions from the audience. 

Though I sat in the near-back of the audience, I was able to ask Dr. Barratt a question. I asked him if, given the opportunity, he would go to Mars. He said he would go to Mars, but only if it was a two-way trip, and he got the permission of his wife (Dr. Michelle Barratt) and five children. In a later question, he said that, if he could, he would go back into space tomorrow.

Sources:

https://www.nasa.gov/astronauts/biographies/michael-reed-barratt/biography

http://www.museumofflight.org/Plan-Your-Visit/Calendar-of-Events/3280/astronaut-dr-michael-r-barratt-featured-speaker

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Barratt_(astronaut)

And following is Annabelle's account of the presentation. ... 

Dr. Micheal Barratt is a NASA astronaut who grew up on a farm outside of Camas, WA. Ever since he was a kid, he was interested in the stars and astronomy. He was first inspired to become a doctor from watching Star Trek, seeing how cool and important “Bones” McCoy was on the ship.

This presentation was part of the Micheal P. Anderson program, allowing kids in middle school to get a running start on a career in aviation. What surprised me is that he actually went to the University of Washington with Anderson without realizing it! He was determined to become a “space doctor” and was in school until he was 32! But all the work paid off, and he become the NASA flight surgeon. After a little pressure from friends to apply, he (semi-reluctantly) became an astronaut!

He flew on STS-133 and was on the ISS for 6 months. However, before he flew, he went through 9 years of astronaut training (it would have been 6, but the Columbia disaster happened previous to STS-133 and they needed extra safety precautions). He said that even if he was happy being a flight surgeon, he loves is job now and he said he’d only retire when NASA told him he had to. He’s a very interesting man and I learned a lot from his presentation. (End of Annabelle's report.)

One of the things Dr. Barratt stressed is that astronauts spend a lot of time talking about mistakes they've made. And it's not to belabor the fact or berate people over it, it's because mistakes are opportunities to learn. I thought that was an important point, and it reminded me of what Stanford Professor Jo Boaler says frequently regarding learning math.

In other news, when we pulled into The Museum of Flight lot we noticed parking spaces were hard to come by. And then we quickly saw why: An enormous Navy plane was taking up most of the space!

      Photo: The Museum of Flight's Facebook page 

Turns out it was a new Navy P-8 Poseidon, made by Boeing. This particular plane is based in Jacksonville, Florida. This  anti-submarine, anti-surface warfare vehicle is replacing the P-3.

Photo: The Museum of Flight's Facebook page 

The P-8 Poseidon carries torpedoes, depth charges, Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and other weapons. It is also able to drop and monitor sonobuoys. Per Wikipedia, the plane had a $256.5 million price procurement cost in fiscal year 2015. Yowza. 

SWEET START: Our Saturday started off sweetly, at another favorite spot, Full Tilt in Ballard. It was, apparently, "National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day." Not sure about the origin or veracity of that claim, but it sounded fun and delicious, so we were in!

People were encouraged to wear their pajamas. The kids were happy to oblige. 

They each enjoyed a Belgian waffle topped with two big scoops of ice cream.

There are worse ways to start a Saturday!