Rocket science a blast for blind Kane'ohe teen
By Eloise Aguiar National Federation of the Blind and NASA
KANE'OHE — When it comes to launching rockets, a group of blind teenagers, including Castle High School student Keao Wright, has proven that sight isn't a requirement for getting the mission off the ground.
Wright, a 16-year-old sophomore, and 10 other blind teenagers traveled to Maryland and Virginia this month to live and breathe rocket science for a week in a program sponsored by the National Federation of the Blind and NASA.
At the 2005 Rocket On! Science Academy, held in Baltimore and at the NASA Wallops Flight Facility at Wallops Island, Va., students built circuits for the payload, assembled the pieces and launched a 10-foot, 67-pound rocket into the atmosphere, with the help of rocket engineers from NASA.
Wright, from Kane'ohe, made a trip that was filled with firsts:
She also experienced being with other blind kids who were much more independent and capable of getting around.
"The kids there were way different," she said. "They were very advanced. I was jealous about that."
But Wright said she treasures the time spent with people her own age who face the same challenges.
The students, from schools across the United States, spent their days at the national headquarters of the NFB in Baltimore, at the adjacent NFB Jernigan Institute, a $20 million research and training facility, and at the NASA facility in Virginia.
The space camp, the second for the federation, was a great success, said Marc Maurer, president of the National Federation of the Blind.
"Our continuing partnership with NASA is proof that blind students are capable of learning and achieving on the same basis as their sighted peers," he said.
While at Wallops, the students participated in a full-blown launch review with NASA personnel, integrated their experiments in the payload with NASA support systems and conducted a practice countdown, he said.
The mission had its problems with the computer system and a rocket engine that wouldn't fire.
But the problems were resolved and a successful blast-off sent the rocket 5,829 feet in about 23 seconds, he said.
The teens were broken up into groups and each was responsible for a phase of the project.
Wright's group was called the Master Blasters.
Wright was the recovery manager, responsible for tracking the rocket, which landed in the ocean.
Unfortunately, the parachute on the rocket didn't deploy. The rocket broke into pieces with few items to recover, she said. All the experiments were lost and so was the logo for the blind federation, called Whozit.
"Whozit didn't survive," Wright said. "It's probably swimming with the sharks right now."
Despite all that, NFB spokeswoman Linda McCarty said the federation is not only showing kids that they can do this but it is developing techniques that educators can use in their classrooms. Many schools think science courses are too dangerous for blind students or that they can't grasp the concepts, but the space camp proves otherwise, she said.
"What we hope to get out of this is one of them will be the first blind astronaut," McCarty said.
Mona Yamada, Wright's mother, said Hawai'i's blind children don't get all the training they need to lead an independent life, so they end up being more protected.
That is one reason she tries to get her daughter involved with programs like the space camp.
"They learned a lot about space, but they also learned a lot about independence," Yamada said.
Advertiser Windward O'ahu Writer
Keao Wright of Kane'ohe traveled to the 2005 Rocket On! Science Academy in Baltimore, Md., to take part in a rocket-science program sponsored by the National Federation for the Blind and NASA.
