[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 12 (Friday, January 19, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S345-S346]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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                     REMEMBERING CAPTAIN JOHN YOUNG

 Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, we are on the eve of a new era of 
space exploration. We are constructing the world's largest rocket and a 
deep space capsule to send humans to Mars. Two new commercial crew 
capsules are under construction to ferry astronauts to and from the 
International Space Station starting later this year. Huge industrial 
complexes to manufacture and process new rockets and satellites are 
being built in record speed to further advance America's leadership in 
space.
  The successes of space exploration today are built upon the brave 
efforts of NASA's past pioneers. I am saddened to note that, on January 
5 of this year, we lost one of those national heroes, astronaut and 
retired U.S. Navy CAPT John Young.
  Captain Young has been called the astronaut's astronaut. Indeed, if 
you ask around the astronaut corps who they most looked up to, my guess 
is John Young's name would come up quite a bit.
  Captain Young was among the second group of astronauts chosen for the 
early space program. He flew to space six times, the only astronaut to 
fly in the Gemini, Apollo, and space shuttle programs. In addition to 
walking and driving a rover on the surface of the moon, Captain Young 
commanded the very first space shuttle mission.
  Taking off like a rocket and landing like an airplane, the space 
shuttle could not be tested in space without a crew. It was perhaps the 
riskiest flight, spaceflight ever endeavored; yet whether it was 
landing on the Moon or rocketing off the pad in the space shuttle, 
Captain Young was the essence of cool, his heart never topping 90 beats 
per minute.
  By the time John Young retired, he had spent over four decades at 
NASA. First at the Navy and later at NASA, Young dedicated his entire 
career to public service.
  Throughout his career, Captain Young was a tireless advocate for 
safety at the agency. He was a brilliant and intuitive engineer. He was 
known for writing scathing memos regarding safety problems at the 
agency, asking penetrating technical questions at reviews, and doing it 
all with a simple ``tell it like it is'' country-boy mentality that he 
never lost from his central Florida upbringing.
  It may seem a contradiction that the man who commanded perhaps the 
riskiest space mission in history was also one of the agency's most 
outspoken advocates for safety, but it is not.
  Captain Young strongly believed we must explore the unknown and push 
further out into the cosmos, but he also believed the men and women who 
bravely venture into space on all our behalves deserve the very best we 
can do to bring them home safely.
  We are seeing the fruits of nearly a decade of transformation and 
renewal, while at the same time reverently marking the passing of the 
first generation of space explorers. Just in the last few years, in 
addition to John Young, we have lost John Glenn, Scott Carpenter, Gene 
Cernan, Dick Gordon,

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Edgar Mitchell, and Neil Armstrong. We have also lost the great Sally 
Ride. While we mourn the loss of these American heroes, we are forever 
indebted to them for their extraordinary contributions to humanity.
  I am so grateful NASA has had over the years the kinds of wisdom, 
experience, and technical skills in its leadership that were so 
embodied by heroes like Captain Young. We are extremely fortunate to 
have, in NASA Acting Administrator Robert Lightfoot, a leader who is 
universally acclaimed for his competence and professionalism. I have 
the utmost confidence in Acting Administrator Lightfoot and am thankful 
to have his steady hand on the tiller. I will continue to fight to see 
that NASA has leadership that carries on the tradition of having true 
space professionals at the helm of such an important agency.

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