Quotes By Sally Ride

I slept just floating in the middle of the flight deck, the upper deck of the space shuttle.

The experience of being in space didn't change my perspective of myself or of the planet or of life. I had no spiritual experience.

After the Challenger accident, NASA put in a lot of time to improve the safety of the space shuttle to fix the things that had gone wrong.

Because I was a tennis player, Billie Jean King was a hero of mine.

The space shuttle is a better and safer rocket than it was before the Challenger accident.

But when I wasn't working, I was usually at a window looking down at Earth.

The most anxious time was during launch, just because that is so dramatic.

My parents must have done a great job. Anytime I wanted to pursue something that they weren't familiar with, that was not part of their lifestyle, they let me go ahead and do it.

The astronauts who came in with me in my astronaut class - my class had 29 men and 6 women - those men were all very used to working with women.

For whatever reason, I didn't succumb to the stereotype that science wasn't for girls. I got encouragement from my parents. I never ran into a teacher or a counselor who told me that science was for boys. A lot of my friends did.

The view of Earth is spectacular.

It takes a couple of years just to get the background and knowledge that you need before you can go into detailed training for your mission.

I do a lot of running and hiking, and I also collect stamps - space stamps and Olympics stamps.

I have a lot of common sense. I know what needs to be done and how to approach it. I have an ability to work with people on large enterprises.

The fact that I was going to be the first American woman to go into space carried huge expectations along with it.

Different astronauts sleep in different ways.

I liked math - that was my favorite subject - and I was very interested in astronomy and in physical science.

It's no secret that I've been reluctant to use my name for things.

The food isn't too bad. It's very different from the food that the astronauts ate in the very early days of the space program.

So most astronauts getting ready to lift off are excited and very anxious and worried about that explosion - because if something goes wrong in the first seconds of launch, there's not very much you can do.

All adventures, especially into new territory, are scary.

No, I think most astronauts recognize that the space shuttle program is very high-risk, and are prepared for accidents.

I felt very honored, and I knew that people would be watching very closely, and I felt it was very, very important that I do a good job.

I had both male and female heroes.

NASA has to approve whatever we wear, so there are clothes to choose from, like space shorts - we wear those a lot - and NASA T-shirts.

For quite some time, women at NASA only had scientific backgrounds.

I was always very interested in science, and I knew that for me, science was a better long-term career than tennis.

When you're getting ready to launch into space, you're sitting on a big explosion waiting to happen.

It takes a few years to prepare for a space mission.

The stars don't look bigger, but they do look brighter.