Astronaut describes Hubble repair mission to area youth

Feustel spoke to about 100 area fourth- and fifth-graders during an event sponsored by the Purdue College of Science.

Feustel recently returned from NASA mission STS-125, an 11-day journey to fix the aging space telescope responsible for images from outer space, including the stars, galaxies, planets and gas clouds.

"It took us eight minutes to get to space on this rocket," Feustel said. "It was a pretty exciting ride."

During the 20-minute talk, Feustel showed students pictures taken during the mission, including the seven crewmembers' view of the Earth and outer space from the back of the shuttle Atlantis.

Feustel and three other crewmembers completed five spacewalks during the 11-day mission. They used the shuttle's robotic arm to hold the telescope in place during each spacewalk.

Feustel described what it was like to orbit the Earth and spacewalk in a 300-pound suit.

"One and a half hours is all it took us to travel all the way around the Earth from 300 miles above the planet," he said. "It took about an hour and a half to get into this spacesuit. It's like wearing your own spaceship."

In another picture, Feustel showed one of the scientific instruments he worked on during the telescope's repair.

"This is the size of a refrigerator, and it weighs 800 pounds," he said. "But in space, since everything is weightless and just floating around the Earth, it weighs almost nothing, and I can move it with just the tips of my fingers."

Feustel, who received degrees in earth and atmospheric sciences and geophysics from the College of Science, said he carried some momentos from Purdue with him during the space mission, including a photo of the Boilermaker Special.

Among the photos were images taken from space of Michigan, the Great Lakes and West Lafayette.

"This is a picture of your town from the space shuttle," he said amid "wows" from the students.

Feustel and his space-walking partners left the telescope and returned to Earth on May 24. Due to bad weather in Florida, the shuttle landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

Feustel's visit to campus was planned by the College of Science in conjunction with the Science Student Counci's Science Week. Following his talk, Feustel answered questions from the audience. Students then broke into smaller groups to complete an activity related to earth and atmospheric sciences.

Writer: Kim Schoonmaker, (765) 494-2081, kschoonmaker@purdue.edu

Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu

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