EL PRIMER COLOMBIANO EN EL ESPACIO

Apreciados Amigos:

Por indagaciones de Julian Mauricio Arenas, nos hemos enterado del hecho de la referencia. Nos ha parecido de la mayor importancia, por lo que estaremos remitiéndolo a la Comisión Colombiana del Espacio.

Agradecemos la divulgación que puedan hacer del tema.

Cordial saludo,


León J. Restrepo Quirós
Secretario
Red de Astronomía de Colombia

Grupo de Investigación en Modelamiento y Simulación Computacional
Universidad de San Buenaventura, Medellín, República de Colombia



e-mail: leon.restrepo@computer.org
Móvil (tigo): 300 778 1618

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: León J. Restrepo Quirós
Date: 19-oct-2007 18:07
Subject: EL PRIMER COLOMBIANO EN EL ESPACIO
To: Ingeniero William Lalinde Velásquez


Respetado Don William:


Como le comenté en la conversación telefónica, el Coronel

George D. Zamka (Colonel, USMC)
NASA Astronaut

es de madre colombiana, para más señas de Bogotá, por lo que según nuestra Constitución Política se convertirá en EL PRIMER COLOMBIANO EN EL ESPACIO el próximo martes durante su misión como Piloto de la STS-120, que llevará el módulo Harmony a la Estación Espacial Internacional.

En el siguiente vínculo aparece la biografía del Coronel Zamka

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/zamka.html


PERSONAL DATA: Born in 1962 in Jersey City, New Jersey. Raised in New York City; Irvington, New York; Medellin, Colombia and Rochester Hills, Michigan. Married to the former Elisa P. Walker of Mississippi. They have two children. He enjoys weight lifting, running, bicycling, scuba and boating. His mother, Sofia Zamka and brother Conrad P. Zamka both live in Florida. His father, Conrad Zamka resides in Indiana.


Ver particularmente el párrafo que anexo, de la entrevista que se le hace previa a la misión:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/sts120/sts120_interview_zamka.html

If you could tell me place where you grew up, how, how the people and that place influence you.

...Probably the one thing that's relevant to what I do here is that we would hike to a neighboring town called Ardsley. We would buy rocket kits and we'd take them down to the river and we'd launch these rockets in the river. Thinking back on that, I doubt I could have said, "Hey, I'm going to be a rocket builder because these rockets." I tended to kind of experiment with the instructions. They were more like kid-seeking missiles. They'd be coming off and bend, and then they'd go off for one of my buddies and then barely miss him. … that'd be it, but that was what Irvington was for me. It was, I guess, exploration, having a spirit of adventure and, and going out and doing stuff. Ater that, I moved to Medellin, Colombia, in South America. I lived there for about a year. As a teenager then, I was about 14, if you can imagine that's kind of a tough experience because this was not moving and living in an American compound or living amongst Americans. My mother is Colombian. It was living on the economy in the civilization as a teenager. Although I knew Spanish somewhat I had to learn fast in order to get along with the kids. I had cousins there that helped me with the transitions and their friends were my friends and we all got along. It was, it was happy time, but it was, it was a tough adaptation, to be an American kid and then suddenly become a Colombian kid and learned soccer, and learn all the colloquialisms and how to get by as a kid. But I do remember sitting in a classroom one time -- went to a school that spoke both English and Spanish and some of the classes were conducted in Spanish. I don't remember what kind of class it was but I was taking notes down and, I thought, "My goodness, I am glad I understand Spanish." I would never have done that if I had, had not moved here, and so that gave me an appreciation for learning other languages and cultures and that has served me here, obviously since we're doing the International Space Station. After that, I moved up to Rochester, Michigan. It's now called Rochester Hills...

Me parece que este hecho debe ser del conocimiento del país y en particular de la Comisión Colombiana del Espacio, para que se tomen medidas en el sentido de posibles colaboraciones y el debido reconocimiento al Coronel Zamka

Le agradecería poner el contenido de este correo en conocimiento del Secretario Ejecutivo de la CCE y del grupo de Astronomía, Astronáutica y Medicina Aeroespacial.

Atentamente,


--
León J. Restrepo Quirós
Secretario
Red de Astronomía de Colombia

Grupo de Investigación en Modelamiento y Simulación Computacional
Universidad de San Buenaventura, Medellín, República de Colombia