EVERETT — Long before he became a Navy pilot and NASA astronaut, Greg Johnson was an inquisitive kid climbing trees too high and building model planes that crashed to the ground in west Seattle.
He was a youngster who took to the soldering iron at an early age, learned lessons by trial and error and kept his eyes to the sky.
“As a child, I always looked up at airplanes,” Johnson told hundreds to students from Horizon Elementary School in south Everett during a visit to the campus last week.
Johnson shared a computer slide show with family photos of his childhood and aviation and aerospace career that literally reached new heights last spring when he piloted a NASA shuttle mission to make repairs to the Hubble Space Telescope. The Atlantis mission was accomplished over 12 days, 5.2 million miles and 197 Earth orbits.
Johnson has a connection to the Mukilteo School District campus. His first cousin, Kristin Denning, and second cousin, Lindsey Sanchez, are teachers there and his father and stepmother, Raleigh and Patsy Johnson, live in Mukilteo.
The astronaut drew oohs and aahs as he showed video footage of the mission, particularly with images of him and his fellow astronauts floating in their spaceship and of stars and the Milky Way.
At a later gathering in the school’s library, he often chuckled at the questions he fielded from fifth graders. He was asked why his NASA uniform had so many pockets, if the shuttle has a toilet and if he believes there is other life in the universe. The uniform pockets hold all sorts of things he needs, such as a cell phone, tools and a flashlight. The shuttle is equipped with a toilet and Johnson believes “there is life beyond our galaxy, and I think we will discover that in the next 50 years.”
Johnson encouraged students in many ways, urging them to never give up their pursuits.
The University of Washington aerospace engineering graduate credited his success to studying and working hard.
He urged students “to try anything and not be afraid to fail.”
Johnson’s words left different impressions with the students.
Second-grade student Antonio Fajardo, 7, said he enjoyed watching video footage of Johnson and his fellow astronauts floating and doing flips in space. The boy said the biggest lesson he learned from listening to the astronaut describe his life is “he has to work hard.”
Fellow second-grader Julissa Pulido, 7, said she would like to go to space to get a moon rock and she was struck by the astronaut’s courage.
“Space people can go up without being scared,” she said afterward.
Classmate Bianca Cain, 7, said she was amazed by the flames during the shuttle launch and thinks people will land on Mars some day.
“I’d like to go into space,” she said.
Johnson, who has logged more than 9,500 flying hours and 500 aircraft carrier landings and who has seen Earth from a perspective few humans ever will, told the students he enjoys his life’s work for one simple reason.
“The part I love about it is being able to learn,” he said.
Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446, stevick@heraldnet.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
