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Kalpana Chawla
Born	July 1, 1961 Karnal, Haryana
Died	February 1, 2003(2003-02-01) (aged 41) Over Texas
Awards
Space career
NASA Astronaut
Previous occupation	Research Scientist
Time in space	31 days, 14 hours, 54 minutes
Selection	1994 NASA Group
Missions	STS-87, STS-107
Mission insignia

Kalpana Chawla (July 1, 1961 – February 1, 2003) was Born in Karnal city India . She was an Indian–American astronaut who, was a mission specialist on the space shuttle Columbia. She first flew on the Columbia in 1997 as a mission specialist and primary robotic arm operator. Chawla was one of seven crew members killed in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster.

Education

Chawla completed her earlier schooling at Tagore Public School, Karnal and her Bachelor of Engineering degree in Aeronautical Engineering at Punjab Engineering College at Chandigarh in 1982. She moved to the United States in 1982 and obtained a M.S. degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1984. Chawla went on to earn a second M.S. degree in 1986 and a PhD in aerospace engineering in 1988 from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Later that year she began working at the NASA Ames Research Center as vice president of Overset Methods, Inc. where she did CFD research on Vertical/Short Takeoff and Landing concepts. Chawla held a Certificated Flight Instructor rating for airplanes, gliders and Commercial Pilot licenses for single and multi-engine airplanes, seaplanes and gliders.

NASA career

Chawla joined the NASA 'Astronaut Corps' in March 1995 and was selected for her first flight in 1996. She spoke the following words while traveling in the weightlessness of space, "You are just your intelligence". She had traveled 10.4 million km, as many as 252 times around the Earth.

Her first space mission began on November 19, 1997 as part of the six-astronaut crew that flew the Space Shuttle Columbia flight STS-87. Chawla was the first Indian-born woman and the second Indian person to fly in space, following cosmonaut Rakesh Sharma who flew in 1984 in a spacecraft. On her first mission Chawla traveled over 10.4 million miles in 252 orbits of the earth, logging more than 372 hours in space. During STS-87, she was responsible for deploying the Spartan Satellite which malfunctioned, necessitating a spacewalk by Winston Scott and Takao Doi to capture the satellite. A five-month NASA investigation fully exonerated Chawla by identifying errors in software interfaces and the defined procedures of flight crew and ground control.

After the completion of STS-87 post-flight activities, Chawla was assigned to technical positions in the astronaut office to work on the space station, her performance in which was recognized with a special award from her peers.

In 2000 she was selected for her second flight as part of the crew of STS-107. This mission was repeatedly delayed due to scheduling conflicts and technical problems such as the July 2002 discovery of cracks in the shuttle engine flow liners. On January 16, 2003, Chawla finally returned to space aboard Columbia on the ill-fated STS-107 mission. Chawla's responsibilities included the microgravity experiments, for which the crew conducted nearly 80 experiments studying earth and space science, advanced technology development, and astronaut health and safety.

Death

Dr. Kalpana Chawla died in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster which occurred on February 1, 2003, when the Space Shuttle disintegrated over Texas during re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere, with the loss of all seven crew members, shortly before it was scheduled to conclude its 28th mission, STS-107.

Awards

Posthumously awarded:

• Congressional Space Medal of Honor
• NASA Space Flight Medal
• NASA Distinguished Service Medal

Memorials

• In Karnal city India ,i.e. Kalpana Chawla Birth Place & Home Town , on 18November2012 , KCGMC Karnal i.e. Kalpana Chawla Government Medical College foundation stone laid by Haryana Government in her fond Memory . Thus Haryana Government has accepted the long pending demand of people of Karnal and now work to establish Kalpana Chawla Government Medical College in Karnal is in its first phase..
• Kalpana Chawla ISU Scholarship fund founded by alumni of the International Space University (ISU) in 2010 to support Indian student participation in international space education programs. Kalpana Chawla International Space University Scholarship
• Kalpana Chawla Memorial Scholarship program was instituted by Indian students association (ISA) at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) in 2005 for meritorious graduate students.
• The Kalpana Chawla Outstanding Recent Alumni Award at the University of Colorado, given since 1983, was renamed for Kalpana Chawla.
• In Karnal city India , At least 30,000 schoolchildren and citizens joined hands to make a 36.4-km-long human chain to support the demand for a Kalpana Chawla medical college in the Karnal city which was announced by then Health Minister of India Dr. C. P. Thakur and later on promised by Prime Minister of India Dr. Manmohan Singh. Kalpana Chawla Medical College Nirman Committee backed by volunteers and activists of various organizations, supported by students from 34 schools, swarmed the roads and formed a chain along the roads in Karnal city to demonstrate that they continued to revere Kalpana Chawla as an outstanding astronaut.
• Asteroid 51826 Kalpanachawla, one of seven named after the Columbia's crew.
• On February 5, 2003, India's Prime Minister announced that the meteorological series of satellites, "METSAT", will be renamed as "KALPANA". The first satellite of the series, "METSAT-1", launched by India on September 12, 2002 will be now known as "KALPANA-1". "KALPANA-2" is expected to be launched by 2007.
• 74th Street in Jackson Heights, Queens, New York City has been renamed 74th Street Kalpana Chawla Way in her honor.
• The University of Texas at Arlington (where Chawla obtained a Master of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering in 1984) opened a dormitory named in her honor, Kalpana Chawla Hall, in 2004.
• Kalpana Chawla Award was instituted by the government of Karnataka in 2004 for young women scientists
• The girls hostel at Punjab Engineering College, is named after Kalpana Chawla. In addition, an award of INR twenty-five thousand, a medal, and a certificate is instituted for the best student in Aeronautical engineering department
• NASA has dedicated a super computer to Kalpana.
• One of Florida Institute of Technology's student apartment complexes, Columbia Village Suites, has halls named after each of the astronauts, including Chawla and others
• NASA Mars Exploration Rover mission has named seven peaks in a chain of hills, named the Columbia Hills, after each of the seven astronauts lost in the Columbia shuttle disaster, including Chawla Hill after Kalpana Chawla.
• Steve Morse from the band Deep Purple created a song called "Contact Lost" in memory of the Columbia tragedy along with her interest in the band. The song can be found on the album Bananas.
• Her brother, Sanjay Chawla, remarked "To me, my sister is not dead. She is immortal. Isn't that what a star is? She is a permanent star in the sky. She will always be up there where she belongs."

  

• Novelist Peter David named a shuttlecraft, the Chawla, after the astronaut in his 2007 Star Trek novel, Star Trek: The Next Generation: Before Dishonor.
• Government of Haryana has made a Planetarium after her name called as Kalpana Chawla Planetarium in Jyotisar, Kurukshetra
• Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur started the Kalpana Chawla Space Technology Cell in her honor.
• Military housing development at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland has been named Columbia Colony. There is also a street named Chawla Way.

See also

• Kalpana-1
• Space science
• Swades – Bollywood movie featuring the space shuttle, filmed on location at KSC in 2004.
• Rakesh Sharma – first Indian in space.

References

1. "Kalpana Chawla". Retrieved May 24, 2012.
2. "Kalpana Chawla Memorial Scholarship". UTEP. Retrieved June 10, 2008.
3. "Kalpana Chawla Award". University of Colorado. Retrieved February 12, 2012.
4. "www.tribuneindia.com". The Tribune. India. Retrieved December 10, 2010.
5. "Tribute to the Crew of Columbia". NASA JPL. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
6. "ISRO METSAT Satellite Series Named After Columbia Astronaut Kalpana Chawla". Spaceref.com. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
7. "More about Kalpana Chawla Hall". University of Texas at Arlington. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
8. "Kalpana Chawla Award instituted". The Hindu. Chennai, India. March 23, 2004. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
9. "Punjab Engineering College remembers Kalpana". The Indian Express. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
10. "NASA Names Supercomputer After Columbia Astronaut". About.com. Retrieved June 10, 2007.
11. "Space Music – Rock/Pop". HobbySpace. August 31, 2005. Retrieved December 10, 2010.
12. "'COLUMBIA IS LOST' A Muse for Indian Women". LA Times (reprint on IndianEmbassy.org). Retrieved June 2, 2007.
13. David, Peter; Star Trek: Next Generation: Before Dishonor; Page 24.
14. "IBN News". Ibnlive.in.com. February 3, 2010. Retrieved December 10, 2010.
15. Saxena, Ambuj. "Kalpana Chawla Space Technology Cell | Flickr – Photo Sharing!". Flickr. Retrieved December 10, 2010.
16. "Space Technology Cell". Kcstc.iitkgp.ernet.in. Retrieved December 10, 2010.

Further reading

• Among The Stars-Life and Dreams of Kalpana Chawla by Gurdeep Pandher
• India's 50 Most Illustrious Women (ISBN 81-88086-19-3) by Indra Gupta
• Kalpana Chawla, a life (ISBN 0-14-333586-3) by Anil Padmanabhan
• The Edge of Time: The Authoritative Biography of Kalpana Chawla by Jean-Pierre Harrison

External links

• Kalpana Chawla Family Foundation
• Celebrating Life of Kalpana Chawla
• Kalpana Chawla Excellence Awards 2012
• Kalpana Chawla profile in India Currents 1998

v t e STS-107
Space Shuttle Columbia disaster
	Main articles	Space Shuttle Columbia Space Shuttle external tank Space Shuttle thermal protection system
	Crew	Rick Husband William C. McCool David M. Brown Kalpana Chawla Michael P. Anderson Laurel Clark Ilan Ramon
	See also	Columbia Accident Investigation Board SpaceHab FREESTAR Hitchhiker Extended Duration Orbiter

v t e NASA Astronaut Group 15, "The Flying Escargot", 1994
NASA Astronaut Group 14 ← NASA Astronaut Group 15 → NASA Astronaut Group 16
Pilots and commanders	Scott Altman Jeffrey Ashby Michael Bloomfield Joe Edwards Dominic Pudwill Gorie Rick Husband Steven Lindsey Pamela Melroy Susan Still-Kilrain Frederick Sturckow
Mission specialists	Michael Anderson Kalpana Chawla Robert Curbeam Kathryn Hire Janet Kavandi Edward Tsang Lu Carlos Noriega James Reilly Stephen Robinson
International mission specialists	Jean-Loup Chrétien (France) Takao Doi (Japan) Michel Tognini (France) Dafydd Williams (Canada)
v t e NASA Astronaut Groups NASA Astronaut Corps Groups 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Related List of astronauts by year of selection Astronaut ranks and positions List of United States Marine Corps astronauts List of United States Space Force astronauts

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• Recipients of the Congressional Space Medal of Honor
• 1961 births
• 2003 deaths
• American aerospace engineers
• American astronauts
• American Hindus
• Aviators killed in aviation accidents or incidents in the United States
• Female astronauts
• Indian emigrants to the United States
• Indian engineers
• People from Karnal
• Punjabi people
• Space program fatalities
• University of Colorado alumni
• University of Texas at Arlington alumni
• Punjab Engineering College alumni
• Panjab University alumni
• Amateur radio people
• Naturalized citizens of the United States
• Indian amateur radio operators
• Amateur radio women
• Indian women scientists
• Women in engineering