A Quote by Henry Petroski

The space shuttle was designed, at least in part, to broaden our knowledge of the universe. To scientists, the vehicle was a tool; to engineers, it was their creation.

Henry Petroski

Quote Topics

Broaden Creation Designed Engineers Knowledge Least Our Part Scientists Shuttle Space Space Shuttle Tool Universe Vehicle

Quote Author

Henry Petroski
American - Author
Born: February 6, 1942

I was a flight engineer on my second flight, which is the most senior position a non-American can have aboard the shuttle. We're the cockpit crew. We fly the vehicle up to space, dock the vehicle to the space station, undock it at the end of the mission, and return it to the ground.

Julie Payette

When I was in high school we had the first shuttle launch, and it reinvigorated my enthusiasm for the space program. I was in awe of the space shuttle as such a tremendous machine taking people into space. It seemed like such a wonderful thing that I wanted to be a part of.

Shannon Walker

The space shuttle has been a fantastic vehicle. It is unlike any other thing that we've ever built. Its capabilities have carried several hundred people into space.

Robert Crippen

It's very sad that there's going to be a hiatus in manned space flight from the U.S. The Shuttle was a fantastic, hugely complex vehicle. It was inevitable it would come to an end, but this is the opportunity for the commercial world to get involved. As the Shuttle era ends, another window of opportunity opens.

David Mackay

Within NASA, the shuttle is perhaps the least-groundbreaking project. Recall that Apollo was about creating brand-new technologies that did something unprecedented - putting men on the moon. The shuttle is, by comparison, a relic designed to make going into orbit routine.

Nathan Myhrvold

NASA asked me to create meals for the space shuttle. Thai chicken was the favorite. I flew in a fake space shuttle, but I have no desire to go into space after seeing the toilet.

Rachael Ray

Computer programmers, biotechnologists, environmental scientists, neuroscientists, nanotech engineers - all of these fields, and more, should have at least a course in ethics as part of their degree requirements.

Jamais Cascio

Half of one per cent of the U.S. budget is space-related stuff. In Canada, we spend more on dog foodScreen Shot 2015-08-19 at 2.39.35 PM. Space flight is intrinsically international and very modern. It's like a co-op. Every country provides services. In Canada, we have a focus on robotics in the shuttle and space station. In exchange, we get research time for our scientists and astronauts' flights. Our contribution is as a junior partner.

David Saint-Jacques

That was in 1994, July, 1994, and I can remember that like it was yesterday too because it was the culmination of a childhood dream to finally be laying on the launch pad inside a space shuttle and getting ready to be launched into space. The impression of going into a space shuttle is that it looks like a brand new simulator. We spend so many hours inside a simulator that everything is very familiar. Every switch, the seats, the way things work, but the vehicle, the actual spacecraft looks brand new because it hasn't been used nearly as much as the simulators.

Leroy Chiao

It's pretty amazing to me that we have had a space shuttle program that's lasted for 30 years - for one space shuttle. That's quite an achievement.

John M. Grunsfeld

The Space Shuttle will stop directly below the Space Station and Sergei and I will be looking out two different windows looking straight down at the Space Shuttle.

John L. Phillips

Technology frightens me to death. It's designed by engineers to impress other engineers, and they always come with instruction booklets that are written by engineers for other engineers - which is why almost no technology ever works.

John Cleese

Engineers use knowledge primarily to design, produce, and operate artifacts. ... Scientists, by contrast, use knowledge primarily to generate more knowledge.

Walter Guido Vincenti

The seemingly insuperable difficulties of deep-space travel suggest an intention to keep us fixed at home in our own solar system, and the physical nature of our part of the Universe, as well as the basic rules of physics and chemistry, have a warning look about them, like barriers designed to isolate intelligent life. This means that for us, unlike the situation for humble microorganisms, deep-space travel is probably a stark impossibility.

Fred Hoyle

When I was a kid, I was a bit of a space geek. I loved the space program and all things NASA. I would read books about our solar system; I had pictures of the Space Shuttle on my bedroom wall. And yes, I even went to Space Camp.