Reaching
For The Stars
Two Jewish
astronauts will
be aboard the
space shuttle
Columbia when
it takes off
next week.
avid Wolf and Martin
Fettman will not make
a minyan in space but
they will make history
when they soar into the
heavens Oct. 14 as part
of the seven-member crew
aboard the space shuttle Co-
lumbia. It will mark the first
time in NASA's history that two
Jewish crew members will fly
aboard a shuttle flight.
"I wanted to be an astro-
naut since before I came here
(to NASA)," said Dr. Wolf, 37,
who is trained as a flight sur-
geon. I remember watching
Ed White doing the first
space walk when I was 11
years old and that got me
particularly interested."
"I was always interested in
being an astronaut, but I nev-
er thought it would be possi-
ble," said Dr. Fettman, also
37. "My mom was even sur-
prised that I had an interest
in this."
The 14-day Columbia mis-
sion will mark the first voy-
age into space for both men.
An-
n-
imm
RUTH BAUM BIGUS
SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
David Wolf is
an Air Force
flight surgeon.
other Jewish man, Laurence
Young, will serve as backup
for Drs. Wolf and Fettman in
the event they are unable to
make the flight. Mr. Young
will handle communications
from the ground for the mis-
sion.
Dr. Wolf grew up in a Con-
servative home in Indi-
anapolis. A graduate of
Purdue University, with a de-
gree in electrical engineering,
Dr. Wolf received his medical
degree from Indiana Univer-
sity. He later went on to com-
plete the U.S. Air Force's
flight surgeon training. Dr.
Wolf is an aerobatic pilot and
has served as a weapons offi-
cer on the F-4 super-sonic
fighter jet. Since 1982, he has
been working in medical re-
search with NASA; he be-
came an astronaut in 1991.
In 1992, Dr. Wolf received the
NASA Inventor of the Year
award.
Brooklyn, N.Y., was the
childhood home for Dr.
Fettman, where he attended
public school and an Ortho-
dox Hebrew school.
"There was a time my fam-
ily thought I might even be-
come a rabbi because I had
become a 'rabbi' of the little
junior congregation of kids,"
Dr. Fettman said. "I remem-
ber really being immersed in
it for awhile, but typical of my
life, I got interested in other
things.
These other interests in-
cluded a love for animals that
eventually led Dr. Fettman to
pursue a degree in veterinary
medicine. He received both
undergraduate and graduate
degrees from Cornell Univer-
sity, and a doctor of philoso-
phy degree in physiology from
Colorado State University.
"There was a time when I
thought I might like to be a
dairy cow practitioner in up-
state New York," Dr.
Fettman said. But those de-
sires soon faded when one of
his professors encouraged
him to go on for his doctorate.
That's when Dr. Fettman met
Dr. Bob Phillips, a professor
at Colorado State, now
NASA's chief scientist for the
space station project. It was
Dr. Phillips, who served as
Dr. Fettman's adviser for
his Ph.D.,
who pushed
the young
man from
Brooklyn to
look toward
the stars.
"When I
was on sab-
batical in Aus-
tralia, he faxed
me and he said
`Hey Marty, are
you still inter-
ested in the
space program?'
I said, 'Of course
I am.' He said
they were get-
ting ready to
have a search for
payload special-
ists for the next round of
spacelab flights.
"So he got me nominated
and that's how it all started,"
Dr. Fettman said.
Unlike Dr. Wolf, who
works full time with NASA,
Dr. Fettman's arrangement
is different. "I am still an em-
ployee of Colorado State Uni-
versity; I'm still a faculty
member, and I am on con-
tract to NASA for the dura-
tion of this mission," Dr.
Fettman said.
Competition for the space
program is tough, but Dr.
Wolf said anyone can apply
to be an astronaut.
"To be competitive for the
final selection for mission
specialist usually takes a doc-
torate degree and other ex-
perience and an adventurous
spirit," Dr. Wolf said.
During the scheduled 14-
day spacelab mission, both
doctors have specific duties.
"My job is spacelab sys-
tems, doing the medical re-
search," Dr. Wolf said. "I will
be a flight engineer on re-en-
try and I will do a space walk
if we should have to. And I'm
openly hoping we have to."
The experiments will cov-
er a broad range of human
physiology research. "The
purpose is to understand
man's adaptation to zero
gravity and then re-adapta-
tion to unit gravity upon re-
turning," Dr. Wolf said.
Dr. Fettman will serve as
Marty Fettman is a veterinarian.
the payload specialist for the
flight. "My duties are pre-
dominately understanding all
the ins and outs of the exper-
iments in the spacelab
module. About half the ex-
periments are human exper-
iments which we conduct on
each other, and the other half
involve the rats which are fly-
ing. As a veterinarian, I have
a lot of responsibility for do-
ing the health checks on the
animals," he said.
"Sometimes we feel like
guinea pigs," Dr. Fettman
said. "It's probably good to be
on the other side for a change
and learn a good lesson."
Both doctors have gone
through extensive training in
preparation for this mission.
"I've trained for a year now
for this flight in all space
shuttle orbiter systems, and
I've worked with the research
investigators to do the exper-
iments properly. We have
emergency procedures train-
ing, and I spend a lot of time
under water in a space suit in
case we have to do a space
walk; it's the most similar to
what it will be like in space,"
Dr. Wolf said.
Dr. Fettman moved to
Houston to train at the John-
son Space Center in January
1992, and his schedule has
been rigorous.
"It's not been mentally
hard," he said. "Sometimes
REACHING page 64
co
o)
co
CC
UJ
CO
F-
63