NASA chief astronaut Chris Cassidy places an astronaut helmet on 11-year-old Anna Paulla at the Mission Control Center.
Anna Paulla Kelly Moura is sure that one day someone from her neighborhood, Rocinha, one of the poorest areas of Rio de Janeiro, will make a space journey.
“One day,” she said.
And considering that Anna Paulla’s curiosity led her to visit NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, where she drove a truck-sized exploration vehicle through a simulated Martian crater and tried on an astronaut helmet that fit her, that “someone” could be her.
Her adventure at NASA began when she submitted a school essay filled with questions about space exploration. This caught the attention of Luciano Huck, a Brazilian television personality. Huck offered to take Anna Paulla to visit the U.S. Space Agency.
Chris Cassidy, NASA’s chief astronaut, who agreed to host her for a day at NASA’s facilities in Houston, quickly noticed her curiosity.
“Can you communicate with your family from space?” Anna Paulla asked Cassidy. He assured her that astronauts spend part of each day sending and reading emails, just like many people do on Earth, and that they make video calls to their loved ones weekly.
“What does a person need to do to become an astronaut?” Anna Paulla wanted to know. Cassidy admitted to Anna that NASA rejected his first application to become an astronaut. But he persevered, and after two years of training, he was accepted. He flew on the space shuttle and worked on the International Space Station.
“There is no single path,” he said, but he recommended that she continue with her scientific studies.
Anna Paulla also asked questions about food. In response, Cassidy offered her a sample of the food that astronauts eat in space.
She had the chance to try on a space suit in the vast Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory, where training astronauts simulate weightlessness. And she visited the bright switch screens at the famous Mission Control Center, where NASA engineers helped put an American on the Moon 50 years ago.
“If one day I go to space, I will certainly walk on the Moon,” she said.
Source: share.america.gov