Even as a child, visions of space exploration filled my fantasies. One year I wanted an erector set and microscope instead of
dolls for Christmas.
I worked in more than one wind tunnel at the NASA-Langley Research Center during my graduate program. Here I am
posing in front of a wind tunnel mock up of an F-5 Freedom Fighter.
In this shot I was filling in as the Flight Dynamics
Officer (FDO) during one of the Space Shuttle Simulations. This is Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center at NASA
Houston.
During graduate school I worked for a while on rotor
accoustics at NASA-Langley. Here I am standing next to a rotor hub like those that are found on helicopters.
My Master's Thesis involved the estimation of
aerodynamic coefficients using wind tunnel data. This is a six foot model of a Northrop F-5 fighter outfitted with sensors. The
government wanted to know what it was about the F-5 design that made the aircraft so inherently stable. The models are flown
manually in the full scale wind tunnel. NASCAR currently owns this facility and uses it not only to test new car designs but
also to explore how race cars moving at high speeds effect the other cars around them.
In graduate school I helped perform tests in
an accoustic chamber at NASA-Langley. I posed for this photo, as well as the wind tunnel photo above, so that the test
facility would have a record showing the scale of the equipment used in conducting the tests.
Here at the UWT we are fortunate to have some of the
finest technology available for the benefit of faculty and students. In this photo I am demonstrating the spreadsheet and
chart creation capabilities of MS Excel. The work is projected onto the screen at the front of the classroom so that students
can compare the work that they are doing at their individual work stations with the examples I provide.
Here I am seated at the instructor's station in one of
the UWT's modern classrooms.
