NASA astronaut Mike Mullane delivers a hilariously candid and often raw astronaut memoir of life in the Space Shuttle era. Selected in 1978 as part of the groundbreaking astronaut class—the first to include women—Mullane exposes the unfiltered reality behind the heroic veneer of NASA.
His stories bounce between bawdy military-flyboy antics, interactions with feminist pioneers and post-doc scientists, and the unforgiving bureaucracy of NASA leadership. Mullane pulls no punches: from drinking games at mission briefings to the embarrassing logistics of urinary-collection devices, no detail is too small or too irreverent.
He recounts the emotional highs of launch and the sublime beauty of orbit, and the heartbreak of losing four crewmates in the Challenger disaster. His tough critique of NASA’s culture—especially its sexist undercurrents and managerial ineptitude—makes this more than a spaceflight chronicle; it’s a cultural memoir of human spaceflight.
With uproarious humor, brutal honesty, and emotional depth, Riding Rockets offers an unforgettable look into the life of an astronaut: the risks, the camaraderie, the mistakes, and the moments of awe that define a generation of space explorers.
- 384 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
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Table of contents
- Cover
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1. Bowels and Brains
- 2. Adventure
- 3. Polio
- 4. Sputnik
- 5. Selection
- 6. The Space Shuttle
- 7. Arrested Development
- 8. Welcome
- 9. Babes and Booze
- 10. Temples of History
- 11. The F***ing New Guys
- 12. Speed
- 13. Training
- 14. Adventures in Public Speaking
- 15. Columbia
- 16. Pecking Order
- 17. Prime Crew
- 18. Donna
- 19. Abort
- 20. MECO
- 21. Orbit
- 22. Coming to America
- 23. Astronaut Wings
- 24. Part-time Astronauts
- 25. The Golden Age
- 26. Challenger
- 27. Castle Intrigue
- 28. Falling
- 29. Change
- 30. Mission Assignment
- 31. God Falls
- 32. Swine Flight
- 33. Classified Work
- 34. āNo reason to die all tensed upā
- 35. Riding a Meteor
- 36. Christie and Annette
- 37. Widows
- 38. āI have no plans past MECOā
- 39. Holding at Nine and Hurting
- 40. Last Orbits
- 41. The White House
- 42. Journeyās End
- Epilogue
- Glossary
- Photographs
- Copyright
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Yes, you can access Riding Rockets by Mike Mullane in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Technology & Engineering & Social Science Biographies. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.