Astronaut Aldrin Presents Scholarship to Miami University Senior Newstadt
Miami University senior Greg Newstadt had an out-of- this-world experience Wednesday when astronaut Buzz Aldrin, one of the first men to set foot on the moon, presented him with a scholarship.
Newstadt, a physics and electrical engineering major from Louisville, won the $10,000 scholarship from the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation, created in 1984 by the six surviving members of NASA’s Mercury Project to back the education of future scientists and engineers.
After his freshman year at Miami, Newstadt went to NASA’s Glenn Research Center, where he worked on simulations of the power demands of the International Space Station. He said he was exceptionally nervous about meeting Aldrin, 76.
Aldrin was at ease with the crowd at Hall Auditorium. He flew 66 combat missions in Korea, walked in space during the Gemini 12 mission and followed Neil Armstrong as the second man to walk on the moon.
He related several anecdotes, from his experience as a fighter pilot to his career as an astronaut.
- On his second kill of the Korean War over North Korean skies: “There are times when people say, ‘Do you dream about going to the moon?’ No. But sometimes I dream about being north of the river doing scissors back and forth with that MiG.”
- On the Apollo guidance system that almost landed his lunar module in a crater: “I’ve got a BlackBerry here and it probably has more memory than what we had in our computer, but it cannot land on the moon.”
- All the Apollo flags planted on the moon were blown down when the lunar modules lifted off. “Neil (Armstrong) didn’t want to tell people about that right away, but it’s been a long time.”
(c) 2006 Dayton Daily News. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.
Source: Dayton Daily News
