The Engineers Who Reached for the Moon: How RPI Turned a Launchpad to the Stars

When Reid Wiseman ‘97 strapped into the Orion spacecraft in April for humanity’s first lunar voyage in more than half a century, he carried with him not just the hopes of a new generation of space explorers, but the legacy of the nation’s oldest technical school — one that has quietly shaped America’s journey to the cosmos. 

Wiseman, a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), commanded the Artemis II mission — a ten-day journey that sent four astronauts around the Moon, farther than any human being has ever been from home. The mission was a homecoming of sorts for RPI, an institution whose fingerprints can be found on nearly every major milestone of the Space Age, from the first footsteps on the Moon to the rovers trundling across Mars. 

Wiseman’s path from Troy to the stars followed a well-worn trajectory. After earning his degree in computer and systems engineering, Wiseman joined the Navy, became a test pilot, and was selected as an astronaut by NASA in 2009. During his 2014 stint aboard the International Space Station, he captivated more than half a million social media followers with photos and musings about the profound experience of seeing Earth from orbit. “My very first thoughts after getting into orbit and having a look at our planet below were — no photo does this justice, and every single person should get to come see this for themselves,” he said. 

Now, as Artemis II commander, Wiseman represents the latest chapter in a story that began more than six decades ago, when another RPI graduate found himself at the center of humanity’s most audacious technological endeavor. 

The Man Who Saved Apollo 

If Reid Wiseman is the public face of RPI’s return to the Moon, George M. Low was the engineer who made the first journey possible, though his name rarely made headlines. 

Low arrived at RPI in 1943. He studied under Paul E. Hemke, founder of RPI’s aeronautical and metallurgical engineering program, and experimented within the basement of the Ricketts Building within the division’s first wind tunnels and engine testing lab. “Whatever I accomplished at NASA or contributed to the space program, really began right here at RPI,” Low stated. He went on to obtain a grasp’s diploma at RPI and in 1958, when NASA was fashioned, turned the brand new company’s first chief of manned spaceflight. 

Low’s defining second got here within the aftermath of tragedy. On January 27, 1967, a flash hearth throughout a launch check killed three Apollo 1 astronauts — Virgil Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee. The catastrophe uncovered elementary flaws within the spacecraft design and threatened to derail President Kennedy’s promise to land Americans on the Moon earlier than decade’s finish. 

NASA turned to Low to resurrect this system. As supervisor of the Apollo Spacecraft Program Office, he led a grueling redesign effort that concerned working ninety-hour weeks for more than a year and a half. Low and his workforce disassembled all two million parts of the command module, uncovering a catalog of doubtless deadly issues: defective wiring, malfunctioning switches, and insufficient backup methods. 

By December 1968, Low had declared the spacecraft flight-worthy and made a daring proposal: ship the primary crewed Apollo mission all the way in which to lunar orbit, forward of schedule. Apollo 8 circled the Moon throughout Christmas week of 1968, sending again the long-lasting “Earthrise” {photograph} and setting the stage for Apollo 11’s touchdown seven months later. NASA Administrator James Fletcher would later write: “Without George Low in exactly the places he occupied at NASA, the United States would not have been able to land men successfully on the Moon.” 

Low went on to function NASA’s deputy administrator and performing administrator earlier than returning to RPI as its president in 1976, a place he held till his dying in 1984, one day after being awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. 

From Apollo 13 to the Space Shuttle 

RPI’s contributions to house exploration prolonged past Low’s management. John “Jack” Swigert Jr., who earned his grasp’s diploma from RPI in 1965, turned an Apollo astronaut that very same yr. His second of fame got here on April 13, 1970, when an oxygen tank exploded aboard Apollo 13, forcing the mission to abort its lunar touchdown. Swigert, the command module pilot (portrayed by Kevin Bacon within the 1995 movie), helped information the crippled spacecraft on a dramatic “slingshot” trajectory across the Moon and again to Earth, a journey that paradoxically took the crew farther from residence than any people earlier than or since. 

The post-Apollo period noticed RPI alumni proceed to push boundaries. Richard “Rick” Mastracchio ‘87 became one of NASA’s most experienced spacewalkers, logging nine spacewalks totaling more than 53 hours outside the spacecraft. His missions included critical assembly and repair work on the International Space Station, the orbital laboratory that has hosted continuous human presence in space for more than two decades. 

The Red Planet Connection 

While RPI’s astronauts captured public imagination, an equally significant contingent of alumni helped extend humanity’s reach to Mars. When the Spirit and Opportunity rovers landed on the Red Planet in 2004, more than a dozen RPI graduates were involved in various aspects of the mission. 

Kobie Boykins ’96 turned a senior mechanical engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and performed key roles in designing three Mars rovers. Frederick Serricchio ‘94 served as the attitude control system engineer for cruise and entry, descent, and landing. Michael Meyer ’74 rose to turn out to be the lead scientist for NASA’s whole Mars Exploration Program. 

The custom continues with newer missions. Bob Balaram, M.S. ’82, Ph.D. ‘85,  served as chief engineer for the Ingenuity Mars helicopter that made the first powered flight on another planet in 2021. The roots of all their work stretch back decades earlier, when an RPI prototype of a Mars rover was featured on Carl Sagan’s Cosmos.

Back to the Moon 

Reid Wiseman will be the most seen RPI alum on the Artemis mission however he’s removed from the one one. Several RPI engineers labored the management room of the mission, testing and monitoring essential instruments guaranteeing the security of the crew. Many others are employed in varied roles in NASA and different house companies. 

RPI’s affect lies, partly, in its founding mission. Established in 1824 as the primary technological analysis college in America, the college has lengthy emphasised sensible problem-solving and methods considering, the kind of abilities wanted for the complicated challenges of spaceflight. 

That interdisciplinary strategy proves important in fashionable house exploration, the place success is determined by integrating mechanical, electrical, software program, and human methods into seamless wholes. It’s the identical systems-level considering that George Low delivered to Apollo’s redesign and that Reid Wiseman will carry to Artemis II. 

As Wiseman and his crewmates return from Earth’s orbit, they’re following a path blazed by their predecessors from Troy: engineers who believed that the toughest issues had been price fixing, that setbacks could possibly be overcome by meticulous work, and that humanity’s attain ought to all the time exceed its grasp.