Mukilteo couple to see astronaut son blast off
Published 10:01 pm Friday, May 8, 2009
It’s not every day you get to see your son blast off into space.
That’s why Raleigh and Patsy Johnson of Mukilteo were headed to Cape Canaveral, Fla., on Friday morning to see off Raleigh’s son Greg Johnson.
Aboard the Atlantis space shuttle, he will pilot NASA’s final shuttle mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. The shuttle is scheduled to leave Monday.
For five days, Atlantis’ seven astronauts will outfit the Hubble with replacement parts, fresh batteries and new instruments. The work should keep Hubble snapping photos of distant space through at least 2014, when its replacement, the James Webb Space Telescope is scheduled for launch.
Raleigh and Patsy, Greg’s step-mother, are excited. They are proud.
And they are nervous.
“The first eight and a half minutes are very intense. The rockets are firing all the time,” Raleigh said.
“We’re looking forward to it going off without a hitch,” Patsy said.
So is NASA.
The mission is unusual and dangerous. The Hubble was not designed for substantial inflight repairs, and concerns after the Columbia disaster led to an earlier mission’s cancellation. NASA now believes it has made this mission safer, and has been eager to proceed.
Still, at 350 miles above Earth, the Hubble’s orbit is littered with space junk.
Those worries are leading to an unprecedented backup plan: a second space shuttle will stand by on a launch pad, ready for a rescue mission.
Greg Johnson went into quarantine Tuesday, and wasn’t available for an interview.
As a former Navy pilot who once was stationed at Naval Air Station Whidbey Island, though, he’s no stranger to risk. He’s logged more than 500 carrier landings in his career.
“‘Risk’ is an interesting word,” he’s quoted on the NASA Web site. “I’ve been in a lot of risky business. I consider flying off aircraft carriers twice a day every day to be a risk I was willing to take.”
Raleigh and Patsy Johnson talked to their son a few days ago, and he said the entire crew was feeling confident.
The Johnsons will get to see their son today at a Kennedy Space Center event for families of astronauts. More of the family will be there, including Greg’s wife, Nanette, five children and stepchildren and a grandchild.
Raleigh, 82, and Patsy, 73, are excited about that.
They are also excited that Greg Johnson, who has been with NASA since 1990, is finally getting to go to space.
“He’s getting to do what he wants to do,” Patsy said. “He keeps making us proud all the time. He never ceases to make us proud.”
Information from the Associated Press was included in this report
Chris Fyall: 425-339-3447, cfyall@heraldnet.com.
