Family Day, Space, Bring the Kids

Our speaker this morning was Bob Morrow, back from his extended holiday and eager to share his knowledge of space, NASA, astronauts, tomato seeds from space and his outstanding power point presentation with truly amazing pictures and views of space.  Bob talked about the deceiving distances – between planets and earth, depending on the position of the sun – we are talking about thousands of kms and hundreds of thousands.  We were able to view the International Space Station and astronauts at work, eating, playing and sleeping.  We saw the Canadarms 1 and 2 functioning and the robot “Dexter” for “fine work”.

Bob talked about the projected Mars trip (7 months there and 7 months back) and the need to solve problems which include food, water and space debris before we can take next steps in order to be able to bring people back from Mars.

Most exciting is the continuation of the Tomatosphere project with greater involvement in the US (it has been primarily Canadian classrooms) and the intent to grow seeds in space as well as have young people grow seeds that have been to space and brought back for distribution. 

Thank you, Bob, for enlightening and exciting the young and old kids in your audience this am!

Dylan Ewen asked for any further announcements and closed the meeting.