Teh One Who Knocks
01-07-2013, 01:01 PM
By Tom Spears, Ottawa Citizen
http://i.imgur.com/FI3D3.jpg
Look who’s corresponding with Canada’s favourite astronaut on Twitter: Everyone from a real space hero to those who proudly served on the starship U.S.S. Enterprise.
And Chris Hadfield is taking the time to answer.
First, William Shatner sent a simple inquiry: “Are you tweeting from space? MBB” (The last bit stands for “My best, Bill" -- his standard sign-off).
Hadfield couldn’t resist the reply: “Yes, Standard Orbit, Captain. And we’re detecting signs of life on the surface.”
Pretty quickly, George Takei picked up on the exchange. He played Sulu on the original Star Trek crew, repeated the Shatner-Hadfield exchange on his Facebook page, and added simply: “This actually happened.”
Then it was Wil Wheaton’s turn. The actor played Wesley Crusher, the slightly goofy junior officer on Star Trek, the Next Generation. He wrote: “If you get into trouble with Nanites while you’re in orbit, I know a guy who can help you contain them. He has experience.”
Hadfield’s reply echoed the Star Trek senior officers who sometimes had a hard time keeping the youngster at his station: “Wesley, we’ve talked about you being on the bridge. I believe you’re needed in Engineering.”
Hadfield quipped that all he needed now was Leonard Nimoy, who played Spock. Presto, Nimoy sent a terse tweet: “LLAP” (short for his Star Trek greeting, “Live long and prosper.”) Hadfield jumped on that too: “I am not Spock either, but living and working in this spaceship comes pretty close. Life mirrors art. LLAP, @TheRealNimoy.” (The astronaut shows his familiarity with Nimoy’s first autobiography, whose title is “I Am Not Spock.”) But perhaps the biggest Twitter coup was a note from Buzz Aldrin, the oldest surviving man to have walked on the moon. He posted this to Hadfield’s Twitter account:
“Neil & I would’ve tweeted from the moon if we could have but I would prefer to tweet from Mars. Maybe by 2040.”
Hadfield is the second Canadian to serve a long-term assignment on the International Space Station, but the first to be publicly available on the Internet. (Bob Thirsk flew in 2009.) Hadfield’s Twitter audience has exploded from a few thousand before his Dec. 19 launch to more than 83,000 now. He has also been posting frequent photos of places ranging from the Bahamas (he likes the shades of blue in the water) to the Sahara.
The space station is about 400 kilometres high and circles Earth every 90 minutes.
http://i.imgur.com/FI3D3.jpg
Look who’s corresponding with Canada’s favourite astronaut on Twitter: Everyone from a real space hero to those who proudly served on the starship U.S.S. Enterprise.
And Chris Hadfield is taking the time to answer.
First, William Shatner sent a simple inquiry: “Are you tweeting from space? MBB” (The last bit stands for “My best, Bill" -- his standard sign-off).
Hadfield couldn’t resist the reply: “Yes, Standard Orbit, Captain. And we’re detecting signs of life on the surface.”
Pretty quickly, George Takei picked up on the exchange. He played Sulu on the original Star Trek crew, repeated the Shatner-Hadfield exchange on his Facebook page, and added simply: “This actually happened.”
Then it was Wil Wheaton’s turn. The actor played Wesley Crusher, the slightly goofy junior officer on Star Trek, the Next Generation. He wrote: “If you get into trouble with Nanites while you’re in orbit, I know a guy who can help you contain them. He has experience.”
Hadfield’s reply echoed the Star Trek senior officers who sometimes had a hard time keeping the youngster at his station: “Wesley, we’ve talked about you being on the bridge. I believe you’re needed in Engineering.”
Hadfield quipped that all he needed now was Leonard Nimoy, who played Spock. Presto, Nimoy sent a terse tweet: “LLAP” (short for his Star Trek greeting, “Live long and prosper.”) Hadfield jumped on that too: “I am not Spock either, but living and working in this spaceship comes pretty close. Life mirrors art. LLAP, @TheRealNimoy.” (The astronaut shows his familiarity with Nimoy’s first autobiography, whose title is “I Am Not Spock.”) But perhaps the biggest Twitter coup was a note from Buzz Aldrin, the oldest surviving man to have walked on the moon. He posted this to Hadfield’s Twitter account:
“Neil & I would’ve tweeted from the moon if we could have but I would prefer to tweet from Mars. Maybe by 2040.”
Hadfield is the second Canadian to serve a long-term assignment on the International Space Station, but the first to be publicly available on the Internet. (Bob Thirsk flew in 2009.) Hadfield’s Twitter audience has exploded from a few thousand before his Dec. 19 launch to more than 83,000 now. He has also been posting frequent photos of places ranging from the Bahamas (he likes the shades of blue in the water) to the Sahara.
The space station is about 400 kilometres high and circles Earth every 90 minutes.