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David.Kerr_#1
Oh well, I must be getting older...Even so, was it not James Dean who was known ...
george.leopold
Adam Steltzner said on the program linked above that he is literally out of a ...
Adam Steltzner, NASA's hipster rocket engineer
George Leopold
8/3/2012 11:44 AM EDT
NASA engineer and media sensation Adam Steltzner is the face of the Mars Science Laboratory mission scheduled to land on the Red Planet early Monday morning (Aug. 6). So far, media attention to Stelzner’s Mars landing team far exceeds its accomplishments.
Steltzner comes across as a bit of a hipster (two pierced ears), media savvy and relentlessly honest about the risks of the mission to land the nearly 1-ton rover Curiosity in a predetermined spot on Mars, Gale Crater. The low-lying site is believed to be among the best places to find evidence that Mars once harbored the ingredients for life.
Steltzner also represents a new breed of engineer. The Bay Area native is a rocker, as the Elvis haircut attests. He eventually discarded “sex, drugs and rock-n-roll” to earn a PhD in engineering physics. “Engineering gave me an opportunity to be gainfully employed, really understanding my world with these laws and equations that govern it,” Steltzner told NPR’s Joe Palca in an interview broadcast on Friday (Aug. 3).
Adam Steltzner, head of NASA JPL's Mars landing team, and his sky crane lander.
Putting his doctorate to good use, Steltzner said he needed “a little bit of sexy.” That’s how he ended up at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory where he has worked for the last decade designing, testing and building the sky crane landing technique that will be used to lower Curiosity to the surface. (NASA’s all-out media blitz for the Mars landing will include live pictures from JPL mission control on giant video screens in Times Square in Manhattan.)
Let’s hope that Adam Steltzner’s Mars spacecraft design is as good as his social media skills, which rival those of astrophysicist Carl Sagan in the annals of planetary science.
Click here to listen to NPR’s interview with Steltzner.
Related story:
New simulation, testing tools used to design Mars lander
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SylvieBarak
8/3/2012 1:31 PM EDT
That guy looks a bit slick to be a hipster. Earrings don't really have anything to do with being or not being a hipster, but that guy's shirt looks far too crisp, and his hair far too gelled and styled to fit the title. Hipsters are typically ruffled, scruffy, unstyled, and the stereotypical ones wear oversized horn rimmed glasses, ironic tshirts and disheveled scarves. Sorry, Adam,you're just not hipster material.
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george.leopold
8/3/2012 1:54 PM EDT
Nor am I
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bolaji.ojo
8/3/2012 2:08 PM EDT
Sylvie, I am curious what you think of the story. He's not hip and he may not be a hipster.
Perhaps it's a generational thing but anyone that old with earings on is either trying to be hip, once was hip and trying to keep up with hipness or is really for his age a hipster.
But what really qualifies the guy for hipsterdom in my book is what he's doing. Anyone that can get a robot to land on some planet gazzilion of miles away is doggone hip as far as I am concerned.
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bolaji.ojo
8/3/2012 2:18 PM EDT
Sorry Sylvie, I just remembered one more thing. The greatest hipster that ever lived was . . . . . drumroll please . . . Elvis Presley. He was never (ever) disheveled. His shirts were also crisply ironed and his hair . . . oh la la! The only thing he lacked was a Phd!
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SylvieBarak
8/3/2012 2:40 PM EDT
Bolaji, I'm not saying the guy isn't doing cool things, nor that he's not a rockstar in his, erm, space :) .... he's just not a hipster. The definition of a hipster to today's youth is not what this guy is.
He IS a very fascinating sounding guy, and seems to be doing some amazing things at NASA. I just want to make the point that if you tell a group of young people today that this guy is a hipster, they will raise an eyebrow.
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Muri
8/5/2012 4:02 PM EDT
Today's youth use the word "hipster"?
Aside from here Sylvie, I would like to know the last time you applied that word to anyone yourself!
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SylvieBarak
8/11/2012 5:15 PM EDT
It's used all the time... and I personally have used the word to describe people a lot. Most people my age in the tech space living in the California bay area can be described as "hipster". Do a google image search and you'll see for yourself.
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WaveMan
8/8/2012 7:17 PM EDT
In complete agreement with you on the whole "hipster" debate. I would say my 30 yr old cousin in the Echo Park section of LA is more of a hipster. Technically very savvy, entrepreneurial and business agile, who dresses the ruffled and unstyled way. I guess anyone who is media articulate with a tan and an earring at JPL will make the cut ;-)
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michaela.lassig
8/3/2012 1:41 PM EDT
I agree with this Sylvie Barak. To further this point, go to http://hipsterorhomeless.com/. It will show you the true hipsterdom.
And, I'm sorry but the whole hipster thing is taking away from the actual heart of this article. I think you might mean "Adam Steltzner, NASA's hippest rocket engineer."
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bolaji.ojo
8/3/2012 2:16 PM EDT
Michaela, Glad you got the jist of the story. He's not a "hipster" but he's the "hippest" rocket engineer.
I agree. He's the "hippest" because he's doing really cool things. There are other hip guys with guitars, etc. but this guy is awesomely hip in the engineering community where they do really cool and hip stuff, like land a hunk of machine on some faraway planet.
Did I mention Steltzner is also a "rocker" with Elvis haircut who happens to have given up "sex" and rock-n-roll to get a Phd?
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SylvieBarak
8/3/2012 2:43 PM EDT
Hmmmm.... My husband is a PhD student.... luckily he's not had to make any of the difficult sacrifices Adam has ;) Then again, my husband is also not a hipster... and doesn't have cool Elvis hair.
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Muri
8/5/2012 4:03 PM EDT
Phd holder vs Phd student. Not exactly the same thing.
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george.leopold
8/3/2012 4:40 PM EDT
More to the point, JPL mission managers said Thursday that the Mars Science Laboratory remains on a "consistent and stable course" as it enters the realm of Mars. Therefore, they canceled a scheduled flight path correction maneuver.
So far, so good.
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Sanjib.Acharya
8/5/2012 6:06 AM EDT
This is a good news! Wish all the best to the Sky Crane landing system team for a soft landing on 6th. Today, this has taken place on the front page of the major news papers in India...I thing the whole world will be witnessing this event on 6th making a mark in history.
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DrQuine
8/5/2012 7:04 PM EDT
"7 minutes of Terror" seems to be morphing into "as many as 8 hours" after landing until we get word from Mars. Between the relay satellites being pressed into service to do something new and the earth setting over the Mars horizon just after landing, there may be a delay in getting clear word. In any case, we will be waiting.
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george.leopold
8/6/2012 9:09 AM EDT
To the contrary, it took only minutes to receive the first "thumbnail" pictures from Curiosity on the surface via the Mars Odyssey satellite. A satellite maneuver just before the landing to realign Odyssey's antenna worked perfectly. Hell, the whole thing went like clockwork.
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arunashokan
8/6/2012 9:57 AM EDT
I was fortunately enough this morning to 'chance upon' the LIVE screening of the Mars landing, that of Curiosity that is!!! To see the guys at JPL voice out aloud how everything was going on with pin-point precision sooo many thousands of miles away: It just amazed me with how far we have progressed where we can plan things at such a distance and not miss a single detail in PERFECTION! :)
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ReneCardenas
8/6/2012 11:17 AM EDT
My hats off to the JPL crew, they are doing outstanding work!
Hope other missions to further planets could be realized with the knowledge gained from this mission.
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Tiger Joe
8/6/2012 3:46 PM EDT
People who reinvent themselves are relatively rare. Those who achieve mission success for an orgnization that has come under much public scrutiny lately, are truly 'stellar'.
Question I'd have for Dr. Steltzner was how he managed to endure going back to school with kids at least a few years his junior. He had to have been in school a while to get a PhD.
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george.leopold
8/6/2012 4:57 PM EDT
It appears Steltzner was so supremely focused on engineering physics that he never noticed the age difference of his classmates.
Speaking of kids, he and his wife are expecting their second in about three weeks.
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NewYankEE
8/12/2012 10:33 AM EDT
What an odd & presumptive mix of comments (shrug)
Kudos to the JPL team.
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george.leopold
8/16/2012 11:30 AM EDT
Adam Steltzner and Bobak "Mohawk Guy" Ferdowsi on NPR's "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me!":
http://www.npr.org/2012/08/11/158560487/not-my-job-we-quiz-nasa-engineers-on-mars-candy
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george.leopold
8/16/2012 11:53 AM EDT
Adam Steltzner said on the program linked above that he is literally out of a job at JPL and "will land on Mars for food."
We can't imagine he'll be unemployed for long.
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David.Kerr_#1
9/28/2012 1:59 PM EDT
Oh well, I must be getting older...Even so, was it not James Dean who was known as a hipster. Myself, I would call this guy retro, in style. Something like an extra out of a happy days tv series. Anyways, hat off to the guy that can bring any of this or any science look 'cool' again and give engineering of any type, a boost. And just remember, it was a New Zealander who headed some of the JPL projects over 40 years ago during the Space Race.
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