She may need retired from her former life in orbit however spacewoman and scuba diver NICOLE STOTT remains to be on a mission – to make us all conscious of the important connections between the cosmos and our watery world. She talks to Steve Weinman
Visitors at COMO Cocoa Island within the Maldives have been happy just lately to be joined on their dives by none apart from a veteran astronaut – somebody who had skilled every part from drift dives by way of sat-diving to space-walks in her time.
Even all these many years into the House Age, at a time when well-heeled residents are making their very own fleeting journeys past zero gravity, skilled spacemen and ladies stay a uncommon breed.
For her half, Nicole Stott was having fun with the Indian Ocean reef-diving and a recent alternative to debate her favorite matter: the a number of hyperlinks between the oceans and area.
The South Male Atoll resort, with its 33 overwater villas, was internet hosting what was billed as an “Island Astronaut Camp”, with Nicole’s keep the results of a partnership between COMO and the dual initiatives near her coronary heart, House For A Higher World and the House For Artwork Basis.
Accompanied by instructors from the PADI Cocoa Island dive-centre, Nicole and the friends explored websites equivalent to Shambhala Reef, near the resort, and Bay Reef, set in a 12m-deep lagoon and that includes a thriving array of coral-propagation frames.
The divers have been favoured by the native marine life: blacktip reef sharks, Napoleon wrasse and each hawksbill and inexperienced turtles put in appearances, together with a supporting forged of moray eels, oriental sweetlips, large clams, anemonefish, cleaner shrimps, bannerfish, lionfish and butterflyfish.
After their dives, the friends have been in a position to dine with Nicole beneath the celebrities and proceed their discussions into the evening.
“We’ve been lucky to do these Island Astronaut Camps in a number of of COMO’s lovely places around the globe,” says Nicole. “One of many issues we love about this work with COMO is that they perceive the connection between sea and area – that we dwell on an ocean planet.
“They recognize that the children visiting their places deserve a significant expertise, they usually welcome the youngsters from the native communities to take part. This is essential to us – and, if they will’t get the native children to the resort location, they prioritise getting us out to the native faculties and communities.
“We’re additionally very grateful that these places enable us the chance to get within the water to dive, and that we are able to incorporate conservation actions like coral-restoration, planting mangroves and seaside clean-ups.”
Late to scuba
Nicole Stott found scuba a bit of late in life, she says. “I used to be in my 30s and a bunch of buddies I labored with on the Kennedy House Centre all went to PADI courses collectively. Then all of us did our first Open Water check-out dive collectively on Delray Seashore.
“The entire time, I used to be commenting on how I couldn’t consider I’d waited so lengthy to start out diving!”
That was half a lifetime in the past. New York-born Nicole, now 61, may need been working for NASA however it could take a while earlier than she was chosen to be an astronaut. “I believe I at all times appreciated the connection between what we expertise within the ocean and what we expertise from area,” she says. “Seems to be extra linked than I anticipated.”
Her profession had lifted off in 1987 when, armed with an aeronautical engineering diploma, she joined Pratt & Whitney as a structural design engineer. She shortly moved on to hitch NASA at Kennedy in Florida, and in 1998 transferred to Johnson House Centre in Houston, Texas.
Choice as a NASA mission specialist in 2000 meant two years of coaching and analysis earlier than being assigned to the Astronaut Workplace Station Operations Department. House was beckoning, and Nicole lastly grew to become flight engineer on Worldwide House Station expeditions 20 and 21, and a mission specialist on the linked House Shuttle missions in 2009 and 2011.
The primary of these ISS missions noticed her take part on its first spacewalk, and he or she was additionally the final expedition crew-member to return to Earth through the House Shuttle. Altogether she spent 104 days in area.
‘Each astronaut is a diver’
Nicole’s profession at NASA lasted for 27 years, however when she retired in 2015 she had no intention of sitting again – her mixed area and scuba trajectories had left her on a mission.
She had continued to scuba dive, although she had by no means felt the necessity to progress by way of the PADI ranks and stays an Open Water Diver to at the present time, albeit one with some very esoteric experiences beneath her belt.
These embody many dives within the NASA Impartial Buoyancy Lab (NBL) at Johnson in preparation for zero gravity and people spacewalks, in addition to buying superior abilities in preparation for saturation diving on the Aquarius undersea analysis habitat in Florida.
“Lately each astronaut is a diver – or turns into one once they’re chosen,” says Nicole. A lot of her leisure diving has taken place off the southern Caribbean island of Bonaire. “It’s so accessible and so lovely for all the explanations we dive – color and variety of life.”
New experiences at all times enchantment, nevertheless, and the Maldives got here into that class. “It’s so attention-grabbing to me to see how totally different the life and sweetness could be from one place to a different on Earth – I’m at all times evaluating dives to what I’ve skilled in Bonaire.
“For me, what makes each location a favorite are the individuals I get to dive with. I particularly adore it after I can dive with my son – he’s been diving and loving it since he was 11.” Additionally a diver is Nicole’s husband, Isle of Man-born “area entrepreneur” Christopher. The couple are based mostly in St Petersburg, Florida.
’Can’t simply hop in your spaceship’
The Aquarius undersea analysis habitat mission in 2006 had been “a stand-out expertise” for Nicole. As a crew-member on the NEEMO 9 (NASA Excessive Setting Mission Operations) undertaking, she had labored at depth with 5 different aquanauts for 18 days.
“There was one thing extraordinary about residing in and experiencing the awe and surprise of ‘internal area’,” she displays.
It was Aquarius that offered what she regards as the very best analogue to residing and dealing in area. “As soon as down at 60ft [18m] on the habitat for an hour, your physique is so saturated with nitrogen that you may’t simply swim safely to the floor. Being there for an prolonged time frame, in that excessive surroundings, was each bodily and psychologically as shut as you may get to area.
“You’ll be able to’t simply go exterior with out particular gear to outlive – scuba gear / spacesuit. You’ll be able to’t simply bail to the floor if one thing goes improper – you must get each your crew and your automobile in a protected configuration first, identical to in area, the place you’ll be able to’t simply hop in your spaceship any time one thing goes improper.
“The confined area, the communication along with your mission management workforce, the meals, the minimal strategy to what’s actually wanted to outlive and thrive, the science we do – all are related in each locations. And the exploration and awe and surprise!
“We joke that we get to dwell and work in internal area – surrounded by our planet – to organize to dwell and work in outer area – the place we’re surrounding the planet.”
’The pleasure is the ache’
May another expertise ever beat extra-vehicular exercise – a spacewalk – for thrills? For Nicole every part from the coaching onwards was a pleasure. “Cherished it!” she says.
On the Impartial Buoyancy Lab it had been “very cool to have the ability to dive in preparation for a spacewalk, and to be in a spot the place the water is so clear it’s like air, and diving round an area station in a pool.
“Diving might be the closest you may get to being weightless, particularly if you happen to do a very good job getting your self neutrally buoyant in your dive. Diving within the NBL definitely does pretty much as good as job as I believe we are able to do in water right here on Earth, however you continue to have the drag of the water and the burden and inertia of the spacesuit.
“Working within the 300lb [136kg] go well with within the water might be probably the most bodily difficult factor I’ve ever completed – the pleasure is the ache.
“Fortunately all that work and the challenges within the pool are met in area with nearly easy motion in microgravity – I’m grateful it’s not the opposite means round.
“To simply be capable of dive within the NBL across the area station {hardware} within the pool places you in a very great psychological state, and anticipation of what it is going to be wish to float in a spacesuit round the true {hardware} in area.
“There’s actually no higher technique to set up a familiarity with the outside of your spaceship, area station and exterior {hardware} than being up shut and private with all of it within the pool. We’ve got a cool VR lab that helps too.
“To me, performing a spacewalk is loads like diving for one more cause – it’s a kind of experiences that’s really actually tough to explain, and is a lot extra superior than you ever think about it to be. I extremely advocate them each!”
Emergency alarm
Nicole’s coaching has helped her to avoid any unwelcome “excessive” area or scuba experiences, “however positively issues have gone improper or not as deliberate in each locations. It’s why we put together a lot for all of the issues we expect or know can go improper.
“One in every of my proudest moments in area was the primary time I skilled the emergency alarm going off at 3am, and witnessing how superbly our crew floated out of our crew compartments, accounted for everybody and went to work to resolve the issue the best way we had been educated to do on Earth.
“I believe my PADI coaching and later preparation for the NEEMO mission did the identical for me within the underwater surroundings. Situational consciousness – in your buddy, your gear, your surroundings – are key in each sea and area. I’d argue that situational consciousness pays off to the good thing about all in all environments.”
In London I attended one of many first of what’s deliberate to be a sequence of large-scale dialogue occasions organised by Nicole and her collaborators, this one on the Science Museum.
Maybe nonetheless on the experimental stage, it appeared to fall sufferer to its personal success – it had attracted so many extremely certified visitor audio system to the stage that point constraints decreased the probabilities of a lot significant debate between them.
Because the occasion went on, nevertheless, it did begin to dig fairly successfully into the intricate relationship between area exploration and exploring the seas of our blue planet.
One of many large takeaways for me was the sheer extent to which we at the moment are exploring and monitoring the oceans in minute scientific element utilizing satellite tv for pc overviews. Nicole’s conviction is that each one endeavours in area convey dividends on Earth, as outlined in her ebook Again To Earth or “What Life in House Taught Me About Our Dwelling Planet And Our Mission To Defend It.
At across the identical time because the Science Museum occasion, Nicole’s two non-profits have been working with a 3rd, Ocean Tradition Life, to take over the large screens in Piccadilly with marine-life imagery, calling on people, companies and governments “to hitch the combat to guard Earth’s important ecosystems”.
Watercolours in area
Nicole describes her House For A Higher World as “connecting the space-curious to the space-serious”, whereas the House for Artwork Basis is devoted to “uniting a planetary group of youngsters by way of the awe and surprise of area exploration and the therapeutic energy of artwork”.
The ex-astronaut had the truth is been the primary particular person to provide watercolour work in area. “My artwork is impressed by the awe and surprise I expertise in every single place,” she says.
“The views of Earth from area, my spacecraft, the views of the colorful underside of Aquarius, the unbelievable creatures that we see on our dives, icebergs in Antarctica – the inspiration round us is countless. We’re on a really purposeful mission to encourage individuals to grasp how the entire work we’re doing in area is in the end for the good thing about all life on Earth.”
I questioned what the individuals Nicole meets at her numerous occasions have been keenest to study area and her experiences there?
“Divers specifically have an interest within the similarities between diving and being in area. They’re additionally those who appear to ask about why we’re spending more cash in area than proper right here on our planet, within the ocean, to discover and clear up our planetary challenges.
“We love these conversations, as a result of it offers us the chance to talk to the truth that what we do in area is ‘Off the Earth, For the Earth’ – that every part we’re doing there may be in the end about bettering life on Earth.
“We’re measuring the important indicators of our planet from area – the majority of the essential data we have to perceive the state of the ocean and our planet basically – which is able to then enable us to resolve our best planetary challenges.
“And divers, like everybody, are thinking about what it’s wish to be a human doing human spaceflight.”
The skinny blue line
Had spending time in area modified Nicole? “Sure, I don’t assume you is usually a human and go to a spot like area, expertise that extraordinary vantage level, with out being modified for the higher,” she says.
“I believe the identical is true for diving. Going to area and diving – really any superior and great expertise – needs to be taken as a name to motion.
“You identify a connection to the planet in a complete new means. You recognize the easy – but, I’d argue, compelling – actuality of who and the place all of us are in area collectively.
“We dwell on an ocean planet. We’re all Earthlings. The one border that issues is that skinny blue line of ambiance that blankets and protects us all.
“And the final word name to motion is for us all to simply accept our function as crew-mates and never passengers on spaceship Earth – by doing so, we now have the facility to create a future for all life on Earth that’s as lovely because it appears to be like from area.
“For all of us right here on Earth, I can not categorical extremely sufficient how superb it’s to get beneath water and expertise internal area – to grasp the interconnectivity of all life on Earth, to expertise the wonder, and to develop a higher appreciation for the awe and surprise that surrounds us day-after-day.
“We simply must open our hearts and minds to it and make the leap!”
Additionally on Divernet: DIVERS FIND TRAGIC SPACE SHUTTLE WRECKAGE, LISA TRUITT: BREATHING LIFE INTO PROTEUS, PHOTOS FROM SPACE THAT POINTED TO ‘TREASURE WRECK’, SHRUNK BUT SLEEPING BETTER, DR DEEP SEA RESURFACES
