**CHANGED PLATFORM TO ZOOM**
New link:
https://ucincinnati.zoom.us/j/93953307345
Please join UC’s student chapter of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics virtually Thursday, March 10th at 7pm.
We will be hosting Michelle Evans as a Distinguished Lecturer. Michelle Evans is the founder of Mach 25 Media (www.Mach25Media.com) and is a writer, photographer, and communications specialist in aerospace. She has written the bestselling book “The X-15 Rocket Plane, Flying the First Wings into Space” which was published by the University of Nebraska Press as part of their “Outward Odyssey, People's History of Spaceflight” series.
X-15 Talk Abstract and Michelle Evans Biography
“The X-15 Rocket Plane, Flying the First Wings into Space”
With the Soviet Union’s launch of the first Sputnik satellite in 1957, the Cold War
soared to new heights as Americans feared losing the race into space. This
presentation tells the enthralling yet little-known story of the hypersonic X-15, the
winged rocket ship that met this challenge and opened the way into human controlled
spaceflight.
This remarkable research aircraft held the world’s altitude record for 41 years,
and still has no equal to match or better its speed of more than 4,500 mph.
Beyond the X-15 are the stories of the 12 men who guided it into space, and all
the people who kept the rocket plane flying for nearly a decade. This is the story
that has never been told of the vehicle that was the true precursor to the Space
Shuttle by being the first piloted and winged vehicle to exit Earth’s atmosphere,
and make a precision piloted reentry to a landing on hard-packed dry desert
lakebeds.
In her research, Ms. Evans conducted 80 interviews, including 9 of the 12 pilots,
such as Neil Armstrong, Scott Crossfield, Joe Walker, and Robert White, with
family representatives for the remaining pilots. Others she spoke with include
managers, flight planners, and the technicians and engineers who made the X-15
ready to fly its next research mission at high altitude and high Mach, expanding
the frontiers of flight research.
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Michelle Evans Biography
Michelle Evans is the founder of Mach 25 Media (www.Mach25Media.com) and
is a writer, photographer, and communications specialist in aerospace. She has
written the bestselling book “The X-15 Rocket Plane, Flying the First Wings into
Space” which was published by the University of Nebraska Press as part of their
“Outward Odyssey, People's History of Spaceflight” series.
Michelle's background in aerospace engineering includes serving in the US Air
Force working on missile systems, and later in private industry accomplishing
environmental testing for systems used in airliners and spacecraft. Her current
work primarily involves exciting audiences about space exploration by speaking
of the X-15 and other areas of the space program at venues across the country,
as well as overseas.
Michelle is a Distinguished Speaker with the American Institute of Aeronautics
and Astronautics, and her book on the X-15 was a finalist for the Eugene M.
Emme Award for Astronautical Literature. Michelle received the Diverse
Community Leader Award from Orange County Human Relations, and was
recognized as number 3 on the Orange County Register’s list of the 100 Most
Influential People in Orange County. She has appeared in numerous
publications, including Air & Space Smithsonian, Ad Astra, Orange County
Register, Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times. Michelle had feature
stories about her life in both Time and Newsweek magazines. She was a
technical consultant on the Neil Armstrong biopic “First Man,” and has consulted
with National Geographic television for “The Real Right Stuff.”
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Ashlee Youngpeters
Supplier Quality Assurance Representative
Pratt & Whitney
Cincinnati OH
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