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Wednesday, May 29, 2002

By Brian Lyman, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Astronaut Stephen Frick's re-entry into Pine-Richland School District went smoothly.

	NASA Astronaut Stephen Frick listens to a question from a pupil at Hance Elementary School in Pine-Richland School District. Frick attended Hance and was the district’s guest of honor on May 17. (Bob Donaldson, Post-Gazette)

He was debriefed by youngsters who asked plenty of questions about living, working and playing in space.

Yes, he told the pupils at the district's three elementary schools, traveling into space is a lot of fun.

No, you can't eat bread in space -- because of weightlessness, crumbs can get into sensitive equipment.

Yes, he wants to go back.

At Hance Elementary School, a more mundane query came up. Twice.

"We get this question all the time: How do we go to the bathroom in space?" Frick said. "Well, a shuttle is like a camper." He didn't quite answer the question, but the pupils didn't press for specifics.

They'd already gotten a look at space travel by watching a videotape Frick brought back from his space shuttle mission last month.

Frick, 37, is a 1982 graduate of Richland High School, now the Richland Elementary building. From April 9-20, he traveled in space with six crew members and a Pine-Richland flag on a mission to install a truss to help with future expansion of the space station and a mobile rail car for the station's robotic arm to aid construction efforts.

Frick was the school district's guest of honor May 17, visiting the three elementary schools, becoming the first inductee into the district's hall of fame, speaking at the middle and high schools, and attending a lunch and dinner reception in his honor.

The astronaut's mission was to tell youngsters in the district a little bit about his journey.

Frick showed the video at Richland and Hance; Wexford pupils got to see a slide show of photos. Both presentations took the viewer step by step through the shuttle mission, from liftoff to touchdown, showing astronauts working on the International Space Station as well as astounding views of Earth from space.

The pupils oohed while watching the violent jolt astronauts experience during takeoff, and they appeared impressed by the shuttle's 17,000 mph speed.

"In 30 minutes, we traveled halfway around the Earth," Frick said to the pupils at Wexford. "If you started in Pittsburgh, you'd be in China."

The video showed the astronauts exercising, washing their hair and playing games. The youngsters enjoyed scenes of the shuttle and space station crew blowing water bubbles in weightlessness. Without gravity, you can put things into bubbles; the video showed one of the astronauts sliding an M&M into a sphere the size of a tennis ball.

The students' mission, apparently, was to affirm Pine-Richland's patriotism. Everyone was asked to wear red, white and blue. At every school, the pupils sang a medley of national songs, including "America the Beautiful" and "God Bless America," as well as the Pledge of Allegiance, which was set to music.

At Richland, a flag hung at the back of the stage, forming a backdrop for the space traveler and creating a scene that could have come from the movie "Patton."

At Hance, Frick was greeted by a group of pupils waving flags that appeared to be as tall as they were.

As an elementary pupil, Frick attended Hance. "What do you think of that?" Principal Richard Pysch asked the pupils in the Hance gymnasium, giving them just the excuse they needed to become loud and rambunctious. They didn't stop during Frick's question and answer period, forcing him to ask for quiet several times.

Frick told the youngsters that things had changed in the district since his school days. At a welcoming lunch in the high school stadium's spirit room, he said, "The last time I saw the high school, this wasn't here yet." Frick said he'd last visited about a year ago.

This trip gave him a better look at the area than his April view from space. "The only time I got a look at Pittsburgh," he told the pupils at Wexford, "it was under clouds."