![]() ![]() ![]() "We try to parallel what's going on in the real space program," she says. The science centre charges $15 per student and a minimum of $62.50 per corporate employee.Įleonore Day, 17, conducts research at Mars Mission Control at the Challenger Learning Centre after disembarking the spacecraft from Earth. It's hidden behind unmarked doors in a hallway at the back of the centre and isn't open to ordinary visitors.Ībout 6,000 to 9,000 students and a handful of corporate groups take part in the program each year. The one at the Ontario Science Centre opened in 1992, and was rebuilt about nine years ago. 28 years later: CBC readers recount Challenger tragedy.Marc Garneau speaks about the Challenger disaster .The mission featured a "Teacher in Space" educational component and one crew member was Christa McAuliffe, a high school teacher from Concord, New Hampshire. The science centre's Challenger Learning Centre is part of a network of 40 educational space simulators created in partnership with NASA by the families of the crew who died when the Challenger space shuttle exploded in 1986. Blast of plasmaĭuration 0:44 Featured VideoSolar flares and dust storms in the forecast Challenger shuttle legacy I'm frustrated after clumsily dropping all three panels. There are constant interruptions - messages from Mars Mission Control, radiation checks from the medical team and updates about potentially dangerous space weather.Īmid the distractions, using two joysticks to manipulate so many rotating, bending joints and a hand is harder than it looks. My job is to examine "solar panels" outside the ship to see how badly they've been damaged by meteoroids. My teammates Ellie Badun of Unionville and Eleonore Day of Etobicoke, both 17, are dealing with dangerous "radioactive" and "toxic" compounds. I'm assigned to a team operating a trio of robotic arms. Our mission is to navigate to Mars and replace a crew that has spent the last two years at a base on the Red Planet and is eager to return to Earth.Įach of us is assigned a job, from the "nav" team calculating a course for the spacecraft to a space weather team that keeps tabs on solar storms that could disrupt electronics and communications on board. Her job is to grasp and examine a trio of solar panels outside the ship to see how badly they have been damaged by impacts from meteoroids. Orion spacecraft helps NASA prepare for future Mars journeyĬBC journalist Emily Chung operates a robotic arm using two joysticks.Our mission is set in the year 2076, when most of my fellow crew-mates will be 60 years old. The crew I've joined is from the Ontario Science Centre's science school, which brings together up to 30 high school students at a time from around the province to complete Grade 12 science and math courses during a semester at the centre. The world's space agencies currently aim to send astronauts to Mars after 2033, so a real base on Mars won't be built anytime soon. Mars One plan has potentially deadly flaws, scientists say.Mars One: 6 Canadians make short list for 1-way trip to Mars.Julie Payette, former Canadian astronaut, says Mars mission is going nowhere.While the Mars One Project now says it aims to send humans on one-way trips to the Red Planet by 2027, experts, including former Canadian astronaut Julie Payette, say the technology won't be ready by then. If you've ever wanted to visit Mars, this is about the closest you can get right now - or might ever get. The program is designed to provide would-be astronauts with an educational and entertaining taste of modern space travel in replicas of a NASA mission control room and the inside of a spacecraft. Mock Mars mission sends astronauts into 'hibernation'.Mars mission simulation ends after 520 days.It's a space simulator that's unique in Canada and part of the legacy of the Challenger disaster in 1986, one of the biggest tragedies in the history of space exploration. Unlike other Mars simulations for scientists and astronauts, this one provides limited access to the public. OK, so I'm not actually in outer space. I'm on the Voyage to Mars at the Challenger Learning Centre at the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto. The lights grow dim, alarms start blaring, and the cabin of the spaceship starts to fill with smoke after the ship is hit by a coronal mass ejection, a blast of plasma from the sun.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |