Interview With Eileen Collins, NASA Astronaut, Shuttle Commander, USAF Colonel: New Film Spacewoman Now Streaming

See below for our interview with Eileen Collins, NASA astronaut, shuttle commander, retired USAF Colonel:

Retired Air Force Colonel and former space shuttle commander Eileen Collins has had an extraordinary life and career.  She was the first woman to command a space shuttle, and she was also the first to successfully execute the ‘pitch maneuver.’  This maneuver allows the astronauts inside of the space shuttle to turn the ship 360 degrees so that the cameras on the space station can be used to check for damage.  This was especially important after the tiny, unnoticed damage that caused the Columbia Space Shuttle disaster.  Her fourth and final mission, before deciding to retire and remain with her family full time, was the return to space mission after the disaster of the Space Shuttle Columbia.  As they discovered during the rotation of the shuttle, the very same damage that had caused that disaster had also occurred on the exterior of their ship.  If they were not removed before they set out to return home, the same thing would have happened with their shuttle.

Thankfully, not only were the defective pieces found, they were also skillfully removed by the astronaut working with Eileen who was trained in spacewalking.  After assuring her that he would ONLY remove the pieces and NOT the tiles that make up the heat shield, he set out to successfully do just that.  As a result, the shuttle was able to return to Earth safely and the astronauts on board were relieved to be home.

While Eileen Collins wasn’t the first woman ever in space (that place was taken by a Soviet woman, and the first American woman in space was Sally Ride, who flew several missions on board the Challeger before its final flight), she was the first woman to ever pilot and command a space shuttle.  And not just the space shuttle was under her command, but the many other astronauts and scientists whose contributions are essential to a successful mission.   Many of our readers remember from their own childhoods the Challenger disaster and the ensuing books about the crew of that final flight.  However, it had many successful missions before its last.

Eileen has learned many lessons in her time as a commander for the space shuttle and commander in the US Air Force.  The very powerful lessons she shared with us had to do with leadership and making mistakes.  In order to be a good leader, you must be a good listener and not try to do everything all yourself.  You have to learn to delegate and to be humble in order to command the respect from others that goes with being a good leader.  Respect and leadership aren’t automatic.

And as Eileen described, many of us struggle with making mistakes.  We struggle to admit to them, to correct them, and to move on.  A good leader must be able to do all of those things and many more.  Especially as an astronaut, but in any career where lives are on the line, one must own up to their mistakes and be able to correct them.  If you leave the blue cord in the red receptacle when it belongs in the blue receptacle, and can’t admit that you did that and correct it, there are likely to be negative consequences.

This is one of our most inspiring interviews, and it is with not just an astronaut or a colonel or a mother or an air force pilot. She is all of those things and more, and she is still inspiring others with her life and her story.  Responding to pressure with grace and humility, never giving up, and learning from your mistakes.  Among many other lessons, these are probably about the most important to a functioning society.

From Eileen M. Collins’ website, describing her career, book, and film: 

Eileen M. Collins is a former astronaut and a retired U.S. Air Force colonel.

She retired from the Air Force in Jan 2005 and from NASA in May 2006 after a 28-year distinguished career. A former military instructor and test pilot, Collins was the first female pilot and first female commander of a space shuttle.

Collins graduated from the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, California, in 1990. She was selected by NASA and became an astronaut in July 1991. After tours at Kennedy Space Center (shuttle launch and landing) and Johnson Space Center (shuttle engineer and capsule communicator), she flew the space shuttle as pilot in 1995 aboard Discovery. She was also the pilot for Atlantis in 1997, where her crew docked with the Russian Space Station MIR. Collins became the first woman commander of a U.S. spacecraft with shuttle mission Columbia in 1999, the deployment of the Chandra X-Ray Observatory. Her final space flight was as commander of Discovery in 2005, the “Return to Flight Mission” after the tragic loss of Columbia. She has logged more than 6,751 hours in 30 different types of aircraft and more than 872 hours in space as a veteran of four space flights.

Collins currently serves on several boards and advisory panels, is a professional speaker and an aerospace consultant. She is married with two children.

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Collins is also a member of the Air Force Association, Order of Daedalians, Women Military Aviators, Women in Aviation International, U.S. Space Foundation, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and the Ninety-Nines.

WORLD PREMIERE Astronaut Eileen Collins is the first woman to pilot and command the space shuttle. From her small town beginnings, she went on to smash many glass ceilings at NASA in her career, culminating in four dramatic and dangerous space shuttle missions. Through sensational archival materials and intimate interviews, Hannah Berryman’s nail-biting film considers the emotional drama Eileen’s family experienced, and a philosophical question about what level of risk is acceptable in human endeavor. – Ruth Somalo