
PERSONAL
DATA: Born
in Karnal, India. Kalpana Chawla enjoys flying, hiking, back-packing,
and reading. She holds Certificated Flight Instructor's license with
airplane and glider ratings, Commercial Pilot's licenses for single-
and multi-engine land and seaplanes, and Gliders, and instrument rating
for airplanes. She enjoys flying aerobatics and tail-wheel airplanes.
EDUCATION:
Graduated from Tagore School, Karnal, India, in 1976. Bachelor of science
degree in aeronautical engineering from Punjab Engineering College,
India, 1982. Master of science degree in aerospace engineering from
University of Texas, 1984. Doctorate of philosophy in aerospace engineering
from University of Colorado, 1988.
EXPERIENCE:
In 1988, Kalpana Chawla started work at NASA Ames Research Center in
the area of powered-lift computational fluid dynamics. Her research
concentrated on simulation of complex air flows encountered around aircraft
such as the Harrier in "ground-effect." Following completion
of this project she supported research in mapping of flow solvers to
parallel computers, and testing of these solvers by carrying out powered
lift computations. In 1993 Kalpana Chawla joined Overset Methods Inc.,
Los Altos, California, as Vice President and Research Scientist to form
a team with other researchers specializing in simulation of moving multiple
body problems. She was responsible for development and implementation
of efficient techniques to perform aerodynamic optimization. Results
of various projects that Kalpana Chawla participated in are documented
in technical conference papers and journals.
NASA
EXPERIENCE:
Selected by NASA in December 1994, Kalpana Chawla reported to the Johnson
Space Center in March 1995 as an astronaut candidate in the 15th Group
of Astronauts. After completing a year of training and evaluation, she
was assigned as crew representative to work technical issues for the
Astronaut Office EVA/Robotics and Computer Branches. Her assignments
included work on development of Robotic Situational Awareness Displays
and testing space shuttle control software in the Shuttle Avionics Integration
Laboratory. In November, 1996, Kalpana Chawla was assigned as mission
specialist and prime robotic arm operator on STS-87 (November 19 to
December 5, 1997). STS-87 was the fourth U.S Microgravity Payload flight
and focused on experiments designed to study how the weightless environment
of space affects various physical processes, and on observations of
the Sun's outer atmospheric layers. Two members of the crew performed
an EVA (spacewalk) which featured the manual capture of a Spartan satellite,
in addition to testing EVA tools and procedures for future Space Station
assembly. In completing her first mission, Kalpana Chawla traveled 6.5
million miles in 252 orbits of the Earth and logged 376 hours and 34
minutes in space. In January, 1998, Kalpana Chawla was assigned as crew
representative for shuttle and station flight crew equipment. Subsequently,
she was assigned as the lead for Astronaut Office’s Crew Systems
and Habitability section. She is currently assigned to the crew of STS-107
scheduled for launch in 2001.
OCTOBER
2000