Richard Arnold is just a regular guy who likes running, fishing, reading, hiking, bicycling and playing guitar.
Oh, and he just happens to be a NASA astronaut who has logged 197 days in space.
Arnold and NASA Administrator Bill Nelson visited the Christa McAuliffe School in Concord on Monday to talk about the emerging Artemis Program that aims to return to the moon and create a sustained human presence there as a base to begin exploring Mars.
The timing wasn’t perfect, since the event came a few hours before NASA announced that it was rolling the massive rocket back into the Assembly Building at Cape Canaveral after problems with valves scuttled planned test firings.
NASA had planned to launch the uncrewed Artemis I into space in June, the next step on its plan to send astronauts to the moon by 2025. It’s unclear how that schedule will be affected by Monday’s decision.
Nelson, a former U.S. Senator, was the second member of Congress to fly in space. He was aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia when it lifted off on Jan. 12, 1986. That flight was two weeks before the ill-fated Challenger mission that took the lives of the entire crew, including Concord’s McAuliffe, who was to become the first teacher in space.
As part of the Artemis Program, NASA plans to bring new American astronauts to the moon, including the first woman and the first person of color. A key tenet of the program is to inspire a new generation of space explorers and encourage careers in science, technology, engineering and math.
At the mention of STEM, the students at the Christa McAuliffe school cheered and applauded their NASA guests, who were joined by U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan and Rep. Annie Kuster.