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NASA set to send teacher into space
CAPE CANAVERAL (Florida), Aug 9: NASA was set to send the first teacher into
space aboard shuttle Endeavour on Wednesday, 21 years after the Challenger
explosion tragically ended the dream of another pioneering
teacher.
Teacher-turned-astronaut Barbara Morgan, 55, has become the star
of the second shuttle mission to the International Space Station this the year,
which has otherwise been marked by embarrassing stories of drunken and
love-crazed astronauts.
First Lady Laura Bush, a former teacher herself,
called Morgan Tuesday to offer congratulations from "one school teacher to
another." Morgan, who was preparing to board Endeavour for the evening launch in
Florida, had trained alongside fellow teacher Christa McAuliffe in the 1980s as
a backup for the Challenger shuttle mission.
The National Aeronautics and
Space Administration had hoped that sending a teacher into space would fire the
imaginations of millions and keep up support for its shuttle program. AFP
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