Iowa returns to space

Iowa is set to return to space before dawn this morning in the scheduled launch of Crew Dragon III with Raja Chari as Commander. Chari, whose family is native to India, was raised in Cedar Falls and graduated from Waterloo Columbus High School in 1995. From there, he enlisted in the Air Force and attended the U.S. Air Force Academy, majoring in aerospace engineering.

Considering himself to be a self-admitted “nerd,” Chari went on to gain his masters at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology while also training as an Air Force and Navy Test Pilot. He applied with NASA to be an astronaut in 2016 and was selected as one of eleven from thousands of aspirants in 2017. Three years later, the world was introduced to Iowa’s newest native son to be awarded astronaut wings when Chari was named Commander of Crew Dragon III.

As head of the mission, he and the crew, which have named their capsule, Endurance, will guide the Falcon 9 rocket and spacecraft from launch at Cape Kennedy to the International Space Station. Chari will then spend six months conducting experiments gauging the effects of microgravity on long term human performance in space to prepare for a possible ride to the Moon with NASA’s Artemis program as early as 2024.

Chari, however, is not Iowa’s first in space, and if he completes the Artemis expedition, wouldn’t even be the Iowan with the most time in the Heavens. That honor goes to Peggy Whitson, the microbiologist from Mt. Ayr, who set the women’s record in space (at the time) with 665 days in orbit when she returned from Expedition 50/51 aboard the Space Station the same year Chari was chosen to be an astronaut.

Two decades before that, James Kelly, of Burlington, like Chari, another graduate of the Air Force Academy, was appointed as an astronaut in 1996 and flew two Space Shuttle missions (STS-102 and STS-114), accumulating 641 hours of Space travel.

That’s no small leap when compared to the experience of Iowa’s first resident in Space, Walter Cunningham. Cunningham, born at Creston in the height of the Depression of the 1930s, was a fighter pilot in the Korean War era, and was selected with NASA’s third group of astronauts in 1963.

He served as Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo VII, the first crewed mission of the Apollo program in Space. Cunningham spent just over ten days circling the Earth at 140 miles above the planet with two other crew members, confirming the efficacy of life support systems for travel to the Moon. The mission splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean on Oct. 22, 1968, with no major flaws, except for the astronauts themselves, who suffered head colds (imagine sneezing in weightlessness) during the flight.

Their pioneering mission blazed the trail that would be followed by subsequent Iowa astronauts including Dale Gardner, of Clinton, who was Mission Specialist in 1983 on the eighth Space Shuttle flight, Loren Shriver, of Jefferson, the former F-15 fighter pilot who flew as Pilot of Shuttle Discovery in 1985, and David HIlmers, a Cornell College graduate, who served as Mission Specialist in four flights from 1985 to 1992.

Perhaps most recognized of all of them, though, is George Nelson and Laurel Clark. Nelson was an astronomer from Charles City who was chosen by NASA as an astronaut in 1978. He gained international recognition when, in September ten years later, on his third flight, he was Mission Specialist aboard STS-26, the first Shuttle mission after the Challenger disaster.

America, sadly, has lost two orbiters in the history of its space exploration programs. The first was Shuttle Challenger, which exploded 73 seconds after liftoff in January 1986, resulting in the loss of all astronauts on board. The second was Shuttle Columbia, when, upon re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere in 2003, the frame and body superheated due to lost heat absorbing tiles, and broke apart over Texas, losing all seven on board.

One of them was Laurel Clark, born in Ames who had trained with the Navy SEALs before being selected by NASA as an astronaut in 1996. Clark spent much of her childhood in the shadow of Iowa State University until moving to Wisconsin where she graduated from the University of Wisconsin as a Zoology major.

She then completed a Doctorate as an MD and served as a physician with a Marine Corps fighter/attack squadron. NASA accepted her for training and Clark was chosen to ride as Mission Specialist on STS-107, the ill fated flight that ended in the loss of all on it. She was buried with full honors at Arlington National Cemetery.

The last Apollo flight was in 1975 and the final Shuttle mission in 2009. Private space flight is the new frontier as humanity reaches back to the Moon and on to Mars. It was the efforts of the above, and so many more, who will make that possible. Godspeed to Chari, and his crew, as they prepare the way for the rest to come.

David V. Wendell is a Marion historian, author and special events coordinator specializing in American history.