From Challenger to Challenger Deep

In 1984, Kathy Sullivan became the first female NASA astronaut to walk in space.  She was thirty-six years old.  On October 11, 1984 she and fellow astronaut, Lieut. Commander David Leestma, spent three hours outside of the Space Shuttle Challenger, testing a system for refueling satellites in space. Upon returning to the Challenger after completing their task while 140 miles above the Earth, Sullivan remarked, "That is really great".  The mission on which she performed her spacewalk was one of the three Shuttle missions on which she served. She spent five hundred and thirty-two hours in space during her distinguished, illustrious NASA career. 

One might think that one history-marking achievement being enough for the average lifetime that Kathy Sullivan might have rested on her space-walking laurels for the rest of her life.  She has not. Not even close. 

Photo credit: kathysullivanastronaut.com

Having gone for a stroll one hundred and forty miles above Earth's surface, several days ago Kathy Sullivan dived to the deepest part of the ocean, seven miles beneath the Earth's surface.  She made the 35,810 foot descent to Challenger Deep, the deepest part of the Marianas Trench, in a submersible named (somewhat ironically in my estimation) Limiting Factor and in the company of explorer Victor Vescovo, who funded the expedition. 

Kathy Sullivan is one of eight persons to have descended to Challenger Deep and, not surprisingly, the only person who has descended to the ocean's deepest depth AND walked in space.  When she and Vescovo made it back to the surface, they telephoned the astronauts on the International Space Station to discuss what they had seen.  Why not, right? 

I wonder what is next on her "to-do" list.  If history is any guide, it shall truly be something.  

-AK