Clara woman connected to final Space Shuttle mission

A proud Clara woman watched last Friday, as a project she supervised was carried on the final Space Shuttle mission from the Kennedy Space Centre in America. Michelle McKeon-Bennett from Clara heads up the Applied Science Department at Limerick Institute of Technology (LIT), and was herself destined to become Ireland's first astronaut until illness got in the way during training in 2009. Last Friday however she couldn't have been prouder, as she and her post-grad students watched space shuttle Atlantis STS-135 take off with a life science experiment that tests hypergravity interactions between bacteria and plants by LIT post-grad student Gerard Newsham on board. Michelle, who was herself a research fellow at the Space Life Science Laboratory in NASA in 2003, said minutes after watching the launch that it was unbelieveable. "It's an incredible moment for me, for my post-graduate colleagues at LIT, for everyone concerned," she said. Take-off wasn't certain until the last minute however, which Michelle said added to the nerves. "It was extremely nerve-wrecking all day because the weather conditions put the lift-off at risk," she explained. "Right up to the last second we were still concerned it mightn't happen." It did happen hoever, and Michelle said she couldn't be happier. "We are so proud that Gerard's research project is on board on this hugely historic flight," she said. "We were all on edge watching it here and can only imagine what it was like for Gerard. To be associated with such a significant moment in space exploration is a great honour for him and for LIT, which is the only third level education body in Ireland that has a link with the Space Life Science LAboratory at NASA's Kennedy Space Centre through our internship and research programme." Due to the journey being the programme's last, Michelle said the moment was bittersweet. "For lovers of space exploration as well, this is a sad moment in ways," she said. "Most of us grew up watching and being in awe of the space shuttle and it's hard to believe that it will not fly any more. The space shuttle has given us some of the most significant moments in space operations, tragedies included unfortunately, but it's really hard to believe it's over." Space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to return for touchdown on July 20, the 42nd anniversary of the Apollo II mission that landed humans on the Earth's moon for the first time.