EAA Sport Aviation - February 2011

EAA IN SPACE

Maj. Gen. Joe Engle earned his astronaut wings flying the X- 15 above the 50-mile altitude required for astronaut rating. He went on to command the second shuttle mission, during which he became the only astronaut to manually fly Columbia from Mach 25 to landing to test the flight characteristics of the orbiter.

The crew of STS- 71, the first shuttle mission to dock with the Russian space station Mir, presented EAA with this collage, including an “I Love EAA” bumper sticker that they took aboard Atlantis. During a Today Show interview, Katie Couric, seeing the sticker hanging behind the crew, asked what EAA was. Commander Hoot Gibson noted that all the crew members, including Charlie Precourt, were EAA members, prompting Couric to reply, “That’s the kind of advertising money can’t buy.”

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simulator are required to serve as mission
commander; 500 to serve in the right seat as
pilot) with helping him land safely in five
engine-outs in GA aircraft. “Some of that is
definitely a skill transfer,” Hoot said. “If you
ever wind up without an engine, and you’ve
done a whole lot of simulations, you’ve learned
how to manage energy, how to put it down on
the runway. So in most all of my unintentional
dead-stick landings I’ve put it on the runway.”
Scott, who said his Q200 has “a zillion
quirks, is nasty in the traffic pattern, and on
the ground doesn’t handle very good,” found
“it always seemed to me [that] after I flew the
homebuilt I could fly the shuttle better.”

THE SHUTTLE'S—AND THE ASTRONAUTS’—LEGACY

Another common denominator among the astronauts: strong feelings for the space shuttle, whose seven million pounds of thrust has been likened to “riding a man-made earthquake” at launch.

“The space shuttle is the most fantastic flying machine that ever existed,” Jim said, noting its ability to operate in and out of the atmosphere.

“I think the space shuttle has certainly
delivered everything that was expected,”
Joe said. “It has been a wonderful work-
horse for us, going to and coming back from
space with payloads.”
“It put more people in space than any
other vehicle ever built. The downside is we
lost two crews,” said Hoot, who served on
NASA committees addressing systems
involved in the loss of the Challenger. “We
finally faced up to the fact that this is not
easy to operate, this is not easy to fly, and if
you let your guard down, you pay for it. The
sad thing is, it’s retiring without a replace-
ment system.”
But while the shuttle is retiring, not so
for these astronauts. Charlie is an executive
with Alliant Technology Systems, and Jim is
with Sierra Nevada Corp.’s Space Systems
Group; both companies are developing next
generation space launch systems for the pri-
vate sector. Scott, Joe, and Hoot work as
aerospace consultants. All remain active
pilots and EAA members as well. Jim just
finished repainting his Long-EZ, and Scott is

Charlie Precourt gives the “All systems go!” thumbs up from the cockpit of his VariEze before a flight from Houston’s Ellington Field.

refurbishing his Tri-Q200. Hoot and Charlie still fly their Cassutt and VariEze, respectively. All use single- or twin-engine pistons for business travel. And Joe is talking about rebuilding a Piper L- 4 he bought his son years ago.

Meanwhile, humans will continue to access space, though once the shuttle stops flying, the visceral thrill of its ascent may be lost—except perhaps for homebuilders, if Scott Horowitz is correct. “Flying your homebuilt for the first time,” Scott said, reflecting back on his lifetime in aviation, “ranks up there with the first shuttle flight.”