Sew, you want to go into space with Scott Altman

William Atkins
Wednesday, 08 April 2009 19:29

Science - Space

Scott Altman will be commanding the STS-125 mission that is tackling the service and repair of the Hubble Space Telescope. Another one of Altman’s tasks is to take up to space a piece of gold lamé fabric for a quilt in his home town of Pekin, Illinois.


Quilter Joyce McCloud, who is also the arts and sciences director at the Tazewell County Museum and Education Center, in Pekin, Illinois, is heading up the Space Program Design Contest that is raising money for the local museum in his hometown.

And, besides being a quilter McCloud is also a space enthusiast, which is why she asked Scott Altman to take up into space a piece of fabric for this fund-raising project at the local museum.

The project is for a good cause and entrants to the contest do not have to quilt anything, only design a space-related topic on a piece of paper. McCoud, says, “We don’t want to intimidate people who may not quilt, so all they have to do is design their space quilt on paper, and we’ll do the actual quilting.” [Pekin Daily Times: “‘Jack of all trades’ tackles outer space”]

Pekin, Illinois, is the hometown of Scott Altman, the commander of the space shuttle Atlantis on its STS-125 (or, HST-SM4) mission to repair and service the Hubble Space Telescope (HST).

The NASA Servicing Mission 4 (SM4) is the fifth and final servicing and repair mission to Hubble.

His launch from Florida's Kennedy Space Center, along with crew members pilot Greg Johnson, and mission specialists Mike Good, Megan McArthur, John Grunsfeld, Mike Massimino, and Andy Feustel, is scheduled for May 12, 2009, at approximately 1:11 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (EDT), 1711 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

It can be watched on the NASA Television station, or on your computer at NASA TV.

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