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We hung out all the time at the
local air park and I got to hang

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out with flying people which
really kind of got in to my

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blood.

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My dad shared his passion he had
for flying and our whole family

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spent time out there with him.

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And so I knew somewhere along
the way I was going to do

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something with flying.

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And when it came time to choose
which school I wanted to go to

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after graduating from high
school, I was really, really

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00:00:27,794 --> 00:00:32,065
fortunate that the local
community college at the time,

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Saint Petersburg Junior College
which was in my neighborhood,

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has this really neat program
called Aviation Administration.

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00:00:40,740 --> 00:00:42,942
And as part of that you could
earn your private pilot's

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license.

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And that really set me up nicely
to go on to university where I

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decided to study aeronautical
engineering because I thought,

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"Wow, you know I want to fly,"
and ended up at Embry-Riddle

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00:00:55,388 --> 00:00:56,990
Aeronautical University.

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And it ended up being the best
choice I think I could have ever

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made.

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It really I think was one of the
things that set me up best for

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what I ended up doing later.

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I have a master's degree as well
from the University of Central

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00:01:11,604 --> 00:01:15,108
Florida and that is really an
industrial engineering based

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degree.

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I started working at Kennedy
Space Center after graduating

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from school, I was with a group
of young folks, young engineers,

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who were brought in to
the shuttle program.

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And what our management at the
time discovered was that a lot

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of us didn't have any real like
project management background

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that went, you know -- A lot of
engineering schools at the time

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didn't incorporate that
in to the curriculum.

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00:01:40,400 --> 00:01:44,337
And I was fortunate because
Embry-Riddle had done that, but

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our management decided to work
with the University of Central

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00:01:48,675 --> 00:01:54,380
Florida and put together a very
kind of focused program that

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00:01:54,380 --> 00:01:57,784
allowed us to get this
project management experience.

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00:01:57,784 --> 00:02:02,355
And they offered me a job here
at Johnson Space Center in

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aircraft ops, flying on this
really cool airplane called the

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00:02:06,593 --> 00:02:09,863
shuttle training aircraft that
basically simulated what the

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00:02:09,863 --> 00:02:12,765
landing profile of
the shuttle would be.

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00:02:12,765 --> 00:02:16,503
And after 2 years of doing that
job they had another astronaut

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00:02:16,503 --> 00:02:18,838
selection -- Was very
fortunate, actually.

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00:02:18,838 --> 00:02:22,442
I feel blessed, again pinch
myself kind of stuff, to have

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00:02:22,442 --> 00:02:23,977
been selected in 2000.

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00:02:23,977 --> 00:02:28,181
My first flight assignment was
to a long duration space flight.

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00:02:28,181 --> 00:02:30,617
And that was for
Expedition's 20, 21.

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They kind of overlapped in the
timeframe I was going to be

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00:02:32,752 --> 00:02:33,820
there.

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00:02:33,820 --> 00:02:37,524
And when I flew that first
mission I went up on a shuttle

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and came down on a shuttle.

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00:02:38,625 --> 00:02:42,962
So I flew up on STS 128 which
was a Discovery flight and a

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00:02:42,962 --> 00:02:47,133
little over 3 months later
came home on Atlantis STS 129.

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To be parts of those crews
was really important to me.

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I think I did a good job
while I was up there.