Rotherham ex-miner qualifies as space shuttle pilot

FROM the bowels of the earth to reaching for the stars....that’s the amazing journey of former miner Phil Reeder who has just undergone training as a NASA space shuttle pilot.

His remarkable journey into space began in 2004 when he applied to train with America’s National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and was accepted on a short training stint at Kennedy Space Centre in Florida.

For Phil, a former Wath miner with a life long interest in space travel, it was living the dream.

Since then Phil, who now works in education as a reprographics technician, has gone on to longer sessions as a trainee on NASA's eight day Advanced Adult Space Academy Programme held each year at the Space Camp facility in Huntsville, Alabama.

From 2005, he has trained for the position as mission specialist for the Space Shuttle.

But for the past two years, he has spent his training stints learning to pilot the Space Shuttle from lift off to landing.

The culmination of the advanced eight-day programme is a 24 hour long duration training mission in which crew positions are allotted by the instructors who closely monitor the trainees throughout the week.

And this year, Phil was selected for the position as pilot of the Space Shuttle, giving him the chance to experience first hand all the requirements needed to support the shuttle’s commander from the launch at the start of the training mission to landing the craft at mission end.

And although all the training is carried out in highly sophisticated life-size computer controlled simulators–the only facility of its kind in the world–the experience he has gained could be applied to the real thing.

Said Phil: “Having the opportunity to live the dream is something we all hope for, but I am doing it.

“The training is rigorous, from six in the morning to midnight, but I have enjoyed every minute and now although I cannot fly a plane, I can pilot the Space Shuttle.”

The Space Shuttle operations are due to end in 2010 to be taken over by a programme for developing a new generation  of space vehicles for reaching the moon and beyond, based on Space Shuttle and Apollo technology and high flying Phil wants to be part of that, too.

Added Phil, the only Englishman on the courses: “I want to instil in other people the urge to make the same journey that I have made. The rewards are out of this world.”  

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