The Mary Sue

Anonymous asked:

I'll try not to forget the probable reason for the challenger exploding was women. I'll try real, real hard. Just kidding. Like sports, they just suck.

womeninspace answered:

Ok, you got me speechless. I’m assuming you are a sexist troll, but just in case you are not, let me explain why you are wrong.

You see, I really would like to explain you why the women involved in the cause of the challenger explosion were not to blame. I really would like to explain why the women involved had just as much responsibility as the men and not any more either.

But I can’t, because there were NO women involved.

The cause of the challenger is well understood. The O-rings in the boosters failed due to low temperatures. This could occur since the seals were note tested to the proper environmental conditions, and subsequently objections to the launch were not taken seriously enough. Every person involved in the decision to launch Challenger, even after (the male) engineers of the producer Morton Thiokol raised objections to launching, were male. You can read it all in the Rogers Commission Report.

I can think of 3 women somewhat involved. Sally Ride was part of the Rogers commission researching the disaster, together with 13 males. And astronauts Judith Resnik and Christa Mcauliffe, who were victims of this disaster and both not involved in flying the space shuttle. There rest was male, look at the launch control photos, all male. Even more than today, back then NASA was male dominated. If you really want to blame a gender (which is a ridiculous thing to do anyway), blame males.

I won’t go into your last sexist remark about sports, just note that the youngest person to sail around the world was a woman, Also in for example archery women score similar as men.

I seriously don’t know were you get these ideas. They’re ill informed, just plain wrong, and above all sexist.

themarysue

sciencesoup

Badass Scientist of the Week: Dr. Aprille Ericsson

Aprille Ericsson (1963–) is an aerospace engineer and the first African American woman to receive a Ph.D. in Engineering at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center.

Ericsson spent her childhood in Brooklyn, New York, where she cultivated an interest in science and mathematics. She attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where she received a Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering, and during her undergrad, she worked on a variety of projects geared towards manned space flight, which motivated her to attend Howard University to gain her Masters and her PhD in Mechanical Engineering (Aerospace).

She went on to receive a PhD in Engineering at the Goddard Space Flight Center, becoming the first African American female to do so, and has applied to NASA’s astronaut program.

Eriscsson is currently working as an aerospace engineer at GSFC, where she designs and tests spacecraft, so if you think of any major space missions over the last twenty years, there’s a good chance Ericsson was involved in their success.

She’s also a motivational speaker and a mentor to mainly girls and minorities, and has commented: “I feel obligated to continue to help spur the interest of minorities and females in the math, science and engineering disciplines. Without diversity in all fields the United States will not remain technically competitive.”

Among other honours, Ericsson has also won four NASA awards for excellence and the 1997 ‘Women in Science and Engineering’ award for the best female engineer in the federal government.

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.