Sally Ride
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LearningTranscript
00:00So she says, I shall be glad when we have the hazards of its navigation behind us.
00:08I know, and the very next...
00:12Cool, the helmet from Sally Ride's first space flight.
00:18Dear Tim and Moby, I keep hearing the name Sally Ride, but I'm not sure who that is.
00:24Can you tell me?
00:26From Emma.
00:28Hi, Emma.
00:30Dr. Sally Ride was a physicist and educator, but you've probably heard of her from her days as an astronaut.
00:36In fact, Dr. Ride was the first American woman to go into outer space.
00:41Nope, she wasn't the very first woman in space.
00:45That honor goes to a Russian cosmonaut named Valentina Tereshkova, who reached Earth orbit in 1963.
00:52It took another 20 years for an American woman to fly into space.
00:56That happened when Dr. Ride made her first voyage on the space shuttle Challenger in 1983.
01:02It was an inspiring accomplishment, and the beginning of a new era in the history of U.S. space flight.
01:08Sure, Ride was born in Los Angeles in 1951.
01:13As a girl, she loved science, but she also excelled in sports like tennis and softball.
01:19She even became nationally ranked in tennis, and dreamed of turning pro.
01:23After some reflection, though, Ride decided to focus on schoolwork instead.
01:29Well, she went to an all-girls school in L.A. before heading off to Stanford University.
01:34She stayed there through graduate school, earning a Ph.D. in physics.
01:38Ride wanted to be a physics professor, but one day she saw a newspaper ad calling for applicants for the National Space Program.
01:45She applied, and sure enough, in 1978, she was accepted.
01:51Over the next few years, Ride went through a lot of training.
01:55She became a pilot, and she worked in mission control for the second and third U.S. space shuttle missions.
02:01She served as a Capcom, or capsule communicator, talking to the astronauts in space, and relaying messages from personnel on the ground.
02:09Right. Eventually, she was selected to be an astronaut herself aboard the shuttle Challenger.
02:15On June 18, 1983, Ride made history when she logged her first space hour.
02:22She was the first American woman in space.
02:26Well, her career moved in a different direction after a terrible incident in 1986.
02:31Ride was training for her third space mission, when the Challenger, carrying seven of her colleagues, exploded shortly after takeoff.
02:40It was terrible. All the astronauts on board died, and the shuttle program came to an immediate halt.
02:46Ride served on the board that figured out what went wrong.
02:50After that, she was reassigned to NASA headquarters to help out with long-term planning for the agency.
02:56A few years later, though, she decided to go back to her original career choice, teaching.
03:01Ride became a physics professor at the University of California's Space Institute.
03:06Later, she worked to educate the general public, and children in particular, about science and technology.
03:13She wrote a number of books, and she started a company that helps kids, especially girls, pursue their interests in science, math, and technology.
03:21Ride continued to help NASA sometimes, too, advising them on things like new goals for humans in space.
03:28Well, in 2011, she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer.
03:33She died the following year at 61 years old.
03:37People from all over the world paid their respects online, in newspapers, and on TV.
03:43After all, she was a hero for many young girls and boys.
03:48I know, but her memory will certainly live on.
03:52You what now?