Moon On Display In Bristol Exhibit
By Andrew Porter, The Hartford Courant, Conn.
May 28–BRISTOL — – The moon may be 238,000 miles from Earth, but a NASA exhibit currently at the Imagine Nation Museum is helping to bring it a whole lot closer.
The traveling exhibit, on display at the museum through Thursday, allows visitors to take a peek into NASA’s future plans for lunar exploration and even examine a moon rock.
The exhibit, titled the “NASA Exploration Experience,” is housed in a large trailer and features a presentation on NASA’s goal of returning humans to the moon by 2020.
The roughly 10-minute presentation uses a variety of ways to showcase NASA’s plan. Beyond the moon rock, highlights include an interactive screen that allows visitors to examine a lunar-science station and a video room that simulates a trip to the moon.
The exhibit is geared toward middle school children, said NASA representative Keyke Reed, though she added that there is also a lot for younger children to enjoy.
“I thought it was very interesting and cool because you got to know what it is like to be on the moon,” said Stefanie Lamy, 10. Her mother, Linda Lamy said she thought the exhibit was good because, “it was very interactive and hands on,” and it was not just “standing and listening.”
“It was really cool, you got to feel the moon rock and you got to interact a lot” said Jon Dolecki, 11. “It’s amazing how we could go to the moon.”
Natalie Hubert was pleased that she brought her three young children to see the exhibit.
“Anything you can do to further their understanding is a good thing,” she said.
In conjunction with the exhibit, the museum is also hosting Don Rethke, a retired engineer from Hamilton Sundstrand, who worked on the original lunar module and earned the nickname “Dr. Flush” for his work on outer space toilets.
“The kids are great, they love this space stuff,” Rethke said. “Once you tweak their minds to think, they want to know everything they can.”
“[The exhibit] is a great opportunity to have something like this experience here for the community to see the future of space exploration,” said Deron Ash, the museum’s director of education.
The exhibit, which is free, will be open from 3 to 7 p.m. today and Thursday.
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