Eileen Collins

UXL Encyclopedia of World Biography, (2003)

Collins credits her rugged astronaut training for preparing her for adversity. Although her pilot experience helped, NASA stretched her far beyond anything she thought possible. She recounted in Ad Astra, "20% of our basic astronaut training takes us through land and water survival, parachute training, field trips to all the NASA centers, and geology field trips. … About 70% of our basic course concerns learning the space shuttle [and] another part is called enrichment training where we learn a little bit about everything—oceanography, the history of the space program, astronomy, orbital mechanics, weather, medicine—all taught at various intervals to give us a feel for the big picture."

Collins later noted that the simulator was one of the hardest parts of her training. During an eight-minute artificial launch, trainers input up to 20 different malfunctions. She remarked in Ad Astra, "You have to prioritize and organize quickly: What's wrong? How to fix it? Find the procedure, then do the procedure. Then you get interrupted with another malfunction. Then you have to decide which one will 'kill me' now, in ten seconds, or in minutes."

As hard as training is in the 1990s, it was much more barbaric 30 years before. Concerning the training of the 1960s, the Irish Times wrote, "[The astronauts later claimed] the physical and psychological tests were devised by a sadist. … [They] rode exercise bikes to exhaustion, swallowed a meter-long rubber hose, drank radioactive water and were prodded, tilted, and spun until they couldn't stand." Such tests were given to the women who were almost the first female astronauts and who share a special relationship with Collins. Known as FLATS (fellow lady astronaut trainees), the 26 women were tested in 1961 along with male astronauts. Thirteen of them passed, becoming known as the Mercury 13. NASA, however, canceled the project before the women ever soared into the galaxy. Sarah Ratley, one of the Mercury 13, told the Kansas City Star after Collins's takeoff, "We all knew Eileen and just kind of felt like we were there going up with her saying, 'Go, go, go.' It was a feeling as if we had finally made it."

In April of 1994, the FLATS had an official gathering, to which they had invited Collins. She returned the favor by offering the 11 surviving women special seats for the Mir launch. Collins told a Cable News Network (CNN) correspondent, "I feel like so many of them have become friends of mine now, and I'm sort of carrying on their dream." She offered to carry with her on the shuttle such mementos as a scarf worn by aviator Amelia Earhart, known for various female "firsts," and a pilot's license signed by Orville Wright for the famed flier Evelyn (Bobbi) Trout in 1924. Everyone gave something except Jerri Truhill, who explained on National Public Radio (NPR), "I told [Collins] she was carrying my dreams, that was all that was necessary."