Hampton native featured in ‘Hidden Figures’ to be honored at Oscar week event

United Steelworkers Local 8888 announced they will host a Distinguished Trailblazer Reception on February 23 , to celebrate Black History Month and to honor the late Jackson was a Hampton native who became the first black female aerospace engineer at NASA in 1958, and is one of three black women portrayed as trailblazers in ‘Hidden Figures.’ Local 8888 has a special connection to Jackson and the inspiring movie, which has grossed more than $110 million since it opened Christmas Day last year.

Johnson, a black NASA pioneer, finds acclaim at 98

Fame has finally found Katherine Johnson – and it only took 98 years, six manned moon landings, a best-selling book and an Oscar-nominated movie. For more than 30 years, Johnson worked as a NASA mathematician at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, where she played an unseen but pivotal role in the country’s space missions.

NASA study shows radiation hits you on a plane

NASA researchers have revealed the results of a major new study into the effect of radiation on high altitude travellers. Cosmic rays from the sun and space crash into molecules in the atmosphere, causing particle decay and radiation which can be harmful to our health.

Popcorn: “Hidden Figures”

Watching director Theodore Melfi’s “Hidden Figures,” about the African-American women working for NASA who were instrumental if not indispensable to getting our first man in space, we scratch our heads and can’t help but ask ourselves, “How come I didn’t know this?” But figuring the truth here isn’t rocket science. So many years after the fact, it’s the same depth of prejudice that hampered Katherine G. Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson and their sister colleagues from convincing the space agency of their genius that has squirreled away their story.

nasa-mars1

When astronauts set foot on Mars, they may stay for months rather than days as they did during Apollo missions to the moon. The surface of Mars has extreme temperatures and the atmosphere does not provide adequate protection from high-energy radiation.