Scott Kelly (1) (1964–)

Manchmal lese ich zur Abwechslung auch ein Sachbuch. Als ScienceFiction-Fan fällt es mir aber auch schwer, nicht den Schilderungen von realen Personen zu folgen, die tatsächlich im Weltall waren. Astronaut Scott Kelly war von März 2015 bis März 2016 fast ein Jahr im Weltall und beschreibt in seinem Buch Endurance seine Erfahrungen zu dieser Zeit. Dabei wird schnell deutlich, dass die Auswirkungen der Schwerelosigkeit absolut kein Pappenstiel sind und der menschliche Körper so einiges show more aushalten muss. Dabei faszinierten mich am meisten die Beschreibungen seines Befindens nach der Rückkehr auf die Erde. Kurz gesagt, lange Aufenthalte in der Schwerelosigkeit verlangen dem Körper Immenses ab. Vieles war mir bis dato noch gar nicht so bewusst.

Wir folgen Scott Kellys Reise ins All, von den Vorbereitungen auf die Mission bis hin zu seiner Rückkehr. Dabei ist Endurance allerdings auch mehr als nur ein Erfahrungsbericht dieser Mission. An vielen Stellen ähnelt das Buch eher Memoiren. Ich selbst fand die Details aus Scott Kellys Leben sehr bereichernd, zeichneten sie doch das Bild eines Menschen, der im Leben nichts auf dem silbernen Tablett serviert bekam. Auch, dass er kein besonders guter Schüler war und er seine Bildung hart erarbeitete, machen ihn sehr sympathisch. Viele Menschen können von seinem Werdegang inspiriert werden. Scott Kelly bricht mit dem Idealbild des Wissenschaftlers und Astronauten als hochintelligenter Übermensch. Er zeigt deutlich, dass man wirklich vieles erreichen kann, wenn man nur hart dafür arbeitet.

Besonders gefallen hat mir, wie stark er betonte, dass die Weltraumfahrt ein menschliches Projekt ist und die Nationen bei der Zusammenarbeit auf der ISS ihre Herkunft in den Hintergrund rücken. Auch, dass ehemals verfeindete Nationen jetzt zusammenarbeiten. Ich persönliche denke, dass genau diese Einsicht, dass die Erde unser aller Planet ist und wir alle Menschen sind, vielen fehlt. Vielleicht braucht es tatsächlich erst einen Flug ins All, um das zu erkennen.

Fazit:
Endurance ist ein gutes Buch, das nicht nur Scott Kellys Erfahrung als Astronaut darstellt sondern auch den Menschen dahinter, der für viele eine Inspiration sein kann, auch wenn der deutsche Titel hier etwas irreführend sein kann. Es geht einfach um mehr, als nur diese Langzeitmission. Klare Leseempfehlung. show less

nonfiction, memoir/anecdotes/advice - I generally liked what the author had to say, but found the book to be rather limited.

As someone who barely graduated high school and also didn't take well to college classes, Scott was inspired after reading The Right Stuff and, having finally found something he enjoyed enough to work towards, was able to become a top fighter pilot (after some mistakes he was lucky to survive, and presumably a lot of hard work after learning from his and others' show more mistakes) and from there went on to become a NASA commander (pilots at NASA are called commanders, and co-pilots are confusingly called pilots). His advice? Don't be afraid to fail, because sometimes the unattainable goal is actually attainable. I think this would be stronger if it talked more about the hard work he put into it, especially coming from a straight cis white man from predominantly white West Orange, NJ. (I'm not faulting him for being born who he is, I am just acknowledging that one is limited to talking about their own experiences, and that his experiences may be completely different from other people's.)

More good advice included here: be an empathetic leader (not the guy that just yells at everyone); be someone who understands that different people benefit from different leadership styles and adapt accordingly; and also be sure to listen to each individual because everyone on your team is an expert in a different way. (It also doesn't hurt to be extremely lucky and not die from potentially fatal mistakes.)

He does acknowledge the need for diversity, applauding NASA for being inclusive of Blacks, POCs, women, and people from other countries (namely Canada, Europe and Japan), and writes that he'd love to see trans people included as well (since his son is trans) but stops short of asking for more social equity--his "very diverse" NASA class of 44 (cadets?) people was still 80% male and 86% white (with only 3 Black graduates and 3 of Japanese descent). I'd have liked to see some acknowledgment that some minority groups may not be offered the same opportunities that he got as a young man with a very poor academic record even though they might have worked 10x as hard. I'd also like to know more about how he managed to get hired on at NASA (a bigger feat in some ways than actually going into space), but maybe that's in his other book.

I liked the Steph Curry anecdote but again I think he could have taken his message further. He cautions against believing conspiracy theories but doesn't offer much help on gauging credibility of sources. To be fair, it is a tough balancing act to try to leave politics out of your book during these massively problematic times, but some credibility guidelines would have added weight to his statements without straying any farther from his careful neutrality.

There's a noticeable amount of filler here, too (is it relevant to know the record for most time in space, or who was the first person in space?) so it feels like he struggled a bit to fill the pages of a 100-ish paged (including large photos), 19cm-tall book. There was enough in there for an entertaining commencement speech, but it felt too skimpy to be a book.

Recommended instead, for today's future leaders: Rising Troublemaker: A Fear-Fighting Manual for Teens by Luvvie Ajayi Jones, which, although the author is a Black woman, isn't really about social justice, but does encourage young leaders to have the courage to speak out about the things that matter to them, a message that I think young leaders need more than anything else right now. show less

Scott Kelly describes the dedication and determination required to become an astronaut. His description of life in space reveals some of the not necessarily obvious nature of the environment, such as the sounds and smells. He also gives a little insight into the psychology of life as an astronaut. A thoroughly fascinating and engrossing read.

Scott Kelly's Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery examines not only his role in the One-Year Mission aboard the International Space Station (with Mikhail Korniyenko as his fellow experimental subject on ISS and his brother, Mark Kelly, remaining on Earth as a control subject), but also serves as a memoir in which he examines the paths that led him from work as an EMT to the U.S. Navy and eventually NASA. Kelly discusses how he learned to value a challenge and, while many of show more his experiences may not have been his first choice, he set about to master them when they presented themselves.
Kelly draws upon Alfred Lansing's Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage as a parallel to some of the challenges he faced on the remote ISS (the title similarity is obvious, but Kelly also brought Lansing's book into space among his personal items). He also references Tom Wolfe's The Right Stuff, both as an inspiration for him to join NASA and for the frankness with which he describes his experiences. The NASA that Wolfe described is long-gone, but Kelly describes a vibrant, flawed, but well-meaning professional organization that can achieve great things if it again received the level of public support (funding) it enjoyed during Project Mercury. Kelly doesn't shy away from pointing out areas for improvement, but he also extends this constructive criticism to himself, and this honesty makes his book all the more compelling. He also relates stories that will make the reader laugh out loud before explaining something that will inspire. A must-read for those interested in human spaceflight. show less