| 9/27/2007 4:12:00 PM | Email this article • Print this article |
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| Air Force Col. Benjamin Drew speaks to students at Gonzaga College High School. |
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Shuttle astronaut Col. Drew returns to Gonzaga, where his 'dream began'
After recently returning to Earth on the space shuttle Endeavor, Air Force Col. Benjamin Alvin Drew returned home Sept. 25 to Gonzaga College High School, where the astronaut was a member of the class of 1980.
Gonzaga, he said, was the place where his "dream began." Addressing a student assembly there, he stressed the importance of a good education. Jesuit Father Allen Novotny, Gonzaga's president, introduced Col. Drew to a packed assembly hall full of boys.
John Bresnahan, a Gonzaga freshman, said, "It was interesting that someone who used to go to our school has done so much and gone so far, even to space."
Col. Drew flew on the 119th space shuttle flight, traveled 5.3 million miles in space, and, with the help of his crew, carried approximately 5,000 pounds of equipment and supplies to the space station and returned with 4,000 pounds of equipment used in previous experiments.
Drew told students the ride into space was violent but that he really didn't have any profound thoughts during the countdown to launch into space.
"You would think I would be having all these profound thoughts, but no. I had 200 guests at the launch and it was kind of like a wedding but you don't get married. I just wanted to get off the ground so everyone who traveled and took time out of their schedules could go home," he said.
However, Col. Drew said that leading up to his mission he reflected on the Gonzaga motto, educating "men for others."
"As I came closer and closer to my launch, I stopped thinking about myself and started thinking about the people who got me here. I was living for the people who were living vicariously through me," he said.
Col. Drew said that the food on the space ship significantly improved from previous years, and the astronauts no longer eat from "toothpaste containers."
The latest invention on the space shuttle was the internet phone, said Col. Drew.
"I would call people and say, guess where I am? I'm traveling at 17,000 mph, and I don't know where I am either."
In the question and answer session, a student asked whether or not TV accurately portrayed the life and training of an astronaut.
Col. Drew said, "It depends on where you get your information from. The Discovery Channel is accurate and sometimes I even learn things from it. Even "Apollo 13" is pretty accurate, but "Space Cowboys" is less so and "Armageddon" is pure fiction."
At the end of the slide show presentation, Col. Drew gave Gonzaga photos of the mission and the original certificate of his successful trip into space.
Father Novotny thanked Col. Drew with a gift-bag and said to the students, "Today you learned in terms of knowledge and inspiration."
Before going to Gonzaga, Col. Drew attended St. Anthony's School in Washington. His first grade teacher then, Benedictine Sister Ursula Butler, said the future astronaut "had a great interest in things related to space."
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