English 102 Writing Project

ESS 102 Writing Project There it was, the Pale Blue dot. A term coined by Carl Sagan which pleasantly haunted me through my years of astronaut training. It was not Mr. Sagan’s description of our little planet which ignited my interest in space and space travel. Rather, the insistence of those close to me that the feat of witnessing the Pale Blue dot was impossible for me. Yet here I floated, on what many call the greatest coordination of countries effort, knowledge and resources, and what others deem a waste of federal tax money; the International Space Station. Now that I was safely aboard, I had to take a moment to be thankful no Coronal Mass Ejections shot towards Earth during launch. We were aware of the plasma sometimes shot towards Earth containing energetic particles which can be up to 10 million Kelvin of CMEs. If a Halo event were to occur, where the particles of a CME were directed at Earth, instruments could be affected by the shock wave. My concern regarding the possibility of this event was minimal. My family who did not understand this threatening nature of the Sun were more concerned. They did not understand that CMEs were caused by the Sun’s magnetic field being wound up around itself creating coronal loops. These loops would twist due to the …show more content…
Back then, I was optimistic regarding my ability to impact the environment here on earth. I do not like to admit that this change of direction was due to the immensely, overwhelming project of cleaning up the Earth’s surface. I’d rather believe that learning about the mass of space debris orbiting Earth drove me to return to college and pursue my PhD in Aerospace Engineering. I suppose I had lost hope that we could reverse the damage strewn across the Earth by humanity. My solution? Get a head start on the next environmental disaster humans were conspiring to