Interview with Astronaut Gregory Chamitoff
In the pile of mail by my front door, I found the August issue of Highlights For Children magazine. Tucked among the magazine articles, was a Q & A I had written about astronaut Gregory Chamitoff (See What a Pro Knows: Gregory E. Chamitoff: Living in Space.) I’m always thrilled to see my work in print!
Chamitoff lived on board the International Space Station for six months with two Russian astronauts, Oleg Kononenko and Sergei Volkov. To write the article, I interviewed second-graders from The Packer Collegiate Institute in Brooklyn, NY. The kids had all sorts of wonderful questions, which I posed to Chamitoff for answers.
Some of my favorite questions from the second-graders were “Is there a steering wheel in the ISS?” and “When you were little did you play astronaut games with your friends?” Chamitoff gave thoughtful answers (“We don’t steer the ISS. The Control Center on Earth does,” and “I once built a flying saucer.”)
Chamitoff talked to me for over an hour, and enthralled me with his stories about space food, his living quarters, and the science experiments he conducted. Check it out!
Gregory Chamitoff playing chess on board the International Space Station.
