THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, December 20, 1994 TAG: 9412200305
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KERRY DEROCHI, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
Lt. Susan L. Still had been waiting for the phone call for more than 15 years.
Step by step, she had prepared for it, working through the pipeline, each new job taking her higher, getting her closer to her goal.
Aerospace engineering degree. Check.
Navy test pilot. Check.
Training in a combat jet. Check.
So, when the call came less than 10 days ago, Still was ready with her answer.
``They asked, `Would you like to fly the shuttle?' '' Still recalled. ``I said, `Yes.' ''
Still, 33, the only daughter of a surgeon in Augusta, Ga., is going to be an astronaut.
``It's just a terrific challenge,'' said Still on Monday. ``It's what I've been looking forward to doing for a long, long time.''
Still, a Navy pilot at Oceana Naval Air Station, was one of 10 applicants selected by NASA recently to train as a pilot in the space shuttle program. Nine other applicants were picked to be mission specialists, the crew members who conduct experiments and are allowed to go outside the shuttle into space.
The 19 applicants - whom NASA calls astronaut candidates - must undergo a year of intense training at Johnson Space Center in Houston. School starts in March.
Those who are allowed to continue after that will train for an average of three more years before being allowed into space.
Still, who is assigned to the F-14 Fleet Replacement Squadron VF-101 at Oceana, was one of two women picked to become shuttle pilots. The other was Air Force Maj. Pamela Melroy, a C-17 pilot at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
In going to Houston, they follow in the footsteps of Air Force Lt. Col. Eileen M. Collins, who, in 1990, was picked as the first woman to fly the shuttle. Collins is to fly her first mission in February on the shuttle Discovery.
For Still, the chance to pilot the shuttle caps a lifelong dream to fly.
In an interview Monday at Oceana, Still said her love of flying goes back to her childhood when she and her three brothers would visit a small airfield near her home in Georgia and watch the planes take off and land.
She was hooked. She knew she would be a pilot.
``I think the biggest motivator was my father,'' Still said. ``When I told him I wanted to be a pilot, I thought he would say, `No way. Women are supposed to be nurses and secretaries.'
``But he was supportive. I've often wondered how my life would have been if he had been discouraging.''
Still got her civilian pilot's license and attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Fla., earning a degree in engineering. She later attended Georgia Tech University in Atlanta, where she got a master's degree in aerospace engineering. She took an engineering job with the Lockheed Corp., an aerospace company.
In 1984, Still called Dick Scobee, an astronaut, for advice on how to join the space program. She knew being an engineer wasn't enough. She knew she needed something more.
Scobee, who had been an Air Force pilot, told her to go into the military.
In 1985, she joined the Navy.
She was training as a pilot in Meridian, Miss., in 1986 when she learned that Scobee had died in the Challenger explosion.
Her determination grew.
Still went on to fly the Navy's EA-6A Intruders in Key West, Fla., one of the only jet assignments available to women at the time.
In 1991, she was sent to Patuxent River Naval Air Station in Maryland to become a test pilot.
She was there in 1993 when she got the word that the Navy was opening its combat jets to women. Still quickly applied.
She arrived at Oceana in January 1994 and began training in the F-14. She accumulated 60 hours of flying time in the jet and was preparing to make her first landing on an aircraft carrier in the Tomcat when the phone call came from NASA.
``It's a great challenge,'' Still said. ``I love flying. The whole concept of flying into space really appeals to me.
``It's been a long time coming.'' ILLUSTRATION: CHARLIE MEADS
Staff
Lt. Susan L. Still will leave Oceana Naval Air Station to begin
training in March with NASA to fly a space shuttle.
KEYWORDS: ASTRONAUT WOMAN PILOT SPACE SHUTTLE by CNB