Expedition
Leadership | Leadership
Types | Leadership
Skills
Leadership
in 30 Days | Leadership
Profiles
Space Shuttle Columbia Crew
 Leadership
Positions: NASA Astronauts
NOLS Graduates: 2001 NOLS/NASA
Leadership Expedition
Teamwork, also referred to as expedition behavior,
is an important component of the NOLS leadership curriculum.
When it comes to team building, nothing can bring a
group closer together than an expedition into the backcountry.
And one organization that knows this better than anyone
is NASA.
Since the fall of 1999, NASA has been relying on
NOLS to give its astronauts the learning experiences
of a lifetime. The goal is to develop leadership skills
and teamwork in preparation for missions to space.
In the summer of 2001, the crew of the space shuttle
Columbia completed a 12-day, 50-mile expedition in
the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming with NOLS Professional
Training.
“Being in the wilderness,” says NOLS Professional Training Director
John Kanengieter, who led the course with NOLS Instructor Andy Cline, “tends
to bring people together. It removes any façade and brings out the real
person. In this case, it brought out the best of everyone.”
When the Columbia crew finally lifted off into space,
they knew one another well. They had seen each other
at trying times, like at the end of the first day of
the NOLS course when they veered off route and had
to backtrack to find their campsite. They had seen
each other tired, sweaty and covered in dirt. But they
had also been together for some great memories, like
when they decided to take a plunge in a high mountain
lake, or when Commander Rick Husband led the crew in
a comic rendition of the song “Kumbaya.” These
moments, said Rick Husband before the mission, brought
the crew together like no other aspect of their NASA
training.
In a BBC radio broadcast that aired in January 2004,
Columbia crewmember Laurel Clark described the crew’s
NOLS experience. “I don’t think any of
us had any idea how many similarities there would be
to the space flight," Clark said. "We were
out in the wilderness for about ten days and we spent
a whole lot of time together as a team solving problems
without any other outside influences, which is similar
to the way that it will be in space.”
“I t was a very positive experience to work
together— learning more about each other and
our different strengths and weaknesses. It was certainly
a great learning opportunity.”
The crew’s leadership skills were put to the
test when they had the opportunity to summit 13,192-foot
Wind River Peak. Kanengieter remembers the astronauts
debated whether or not to attempt the peak ascent.
“They decided if they were going to do it,
they were going to do it together,” Kanengieter
says. “They decided if they supported each other,
they could make it.”
Expedition Leadership | Leadership
Types | Leadership
Skills
Leadership
in 30 Days | Leadership
Profile
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