Margaret H. Hamilton Quotes

So most astronauts are astronauts for a couple of years before they are assigned to a flight.

I think most astronauts are not risk takers. We take calculated risks for something that we think is worthwhile.

In the Astronaut Office we're never totally out of training, we always keep our hand in it. But after five years, things have changed and so it's been good to get back into the flow and relearn a lot of things.

No, I think most astronauts recognize that the space shuttle program is very high-risk, and are prepared for accidents.

Well, with so many space shuttle missions that we've done, I think it's just sort of natural that each one hasn't necessarily gotten the attention that the early ones did.

My key aim is to get man on the surface of Mars by the mid-2030s.

During my 8 years as chairman, I had the privilege to peer into the future to see dynamic citizen astronauts returning to and from the heavens which we can expect in the future.

I had done everything I could do as an astronaut, and we have a long line of inexperienced astronauts waiting for their first missions, and so my role really should be to step aside and help them prepare for their missions, rather than to try to get another mission.

I've been approached to do some things with astronauts and the preparation that astronauts go through.

The Chinese are planning a manned mission to the moon sometime after 2020, and subsequently, to Mars. The U.S. has abandoned that dream.

I was working as a flight director on the Gemini IX mission, and it seemed almost overnight I was picking up the responsibilities for the Apollo Program.

One of the great things about the space program is it's super well-documented.

The basic thing you have to understand is everything that happens on that spaceship, from the time you crawl into that seat to the time it touches down, is controlled from the ground. There's no one thing that makes a good astronaut. I don't know any person with determination and will that can't go to space.

I had thought training for Mercury was rigorous. Once we got caught up in the Gemini training program, our Mercury training looked pretty soft.

Army astronauts have a very proud legacy in the astronaut program.

I can't think of anything specific growing up that pointed me toward NASA at all. I was interested in the Moon landings just about the same as everyone else of my generation. But I never really thought about being an astronaut or working in space myself.

The President wants to go to the moon. We hardly have enough money left in the treasury to go to Baltimore.

We are not building the space station for science any more than we went to the moon for science, but we got a hell of a lot of good science out of it.

We'll continue our quest in space. There will be more shuttle flights and more shuttle crews and, yes, more volunteers, more civilians, more teachers in space. Nothing ends here – our hopes and our journeys continue.

Mars is a long ways away. The moon is only 240,000 miles, but Mars is in the millions. It's too risky without spending more time going to the moon.

I would say I had zero philosophical thoughts at that time. I was operating on a timed checklist that we've been trained to do, to try to maximize every really minute on the moon.

I believe that there will be women astronauts sometime just as there are women airplane pilots.

As far as entertainment, 'The Right Stuff' is a good movie. As far as a documentary of the early space days, which they purported it to be, it is not at all.

I was a naval officer and aviator. I tested airplanes and got selected to be an astronaut later on.

My view is that we should go back to the moon, build up the infrastructure to make flights there commonplace - be comfortable with it - then use that infrastructure to expand and go to Mars.