A University Of Limerick Graduate Is Set To Be The First Irish Person In Space
Oscar Wilde famously said "We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars". Well, not content with just looking at them a University of Limerick graduate, Dr. Norah Paten is getting close to becoming the first Irish person to go to space, leaving the rest of us to wallow in this dang gutter.
Dr. Patten, from Ballina in Co. Mayo, is currently enrolled in a NASA project, designed to train astronauts in conducting experiments in space in the next generation of space-faring vehicles being designed by both NASA and private enterprises such as Space X. She is one of 12 people, who have been selected by NASA, to take join 'Project PoSSUM', which stands for 'Polar Suborbital Science in the Upper Mesosphere.
As reported in Joe.ie, Norah said "This is a fantastic opportunity for me to learn hands on skills, to experience what it is actually like to operate in a pressurized spacesuit, and to feel the g-forces on my body that are experienced during a rocket launch. I really cannot wait."
Her fascination with space began after a family trip to Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre. She studied Aeronautical Engineering in UL, before going on to do a PhD in the same institution. She is currently a faculty member of the International Space University.
We are notoriously a nation with a penchant for emigration, and it seems that Dr. Patten is really trying to take that to the next level.