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Comments: 190 +- Science: First European Commander of the ISS on Sunday October 11, @05:57PM
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RobGoldsmith writes 'ESA astronaut Frank De Winne became the first European commander of the International Space Station this morning with the departure of Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka who had filled this role since April. De Winne is the first non-American and non-Russian to take on this role. Watch the videos and view images here.'
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Let me be the first... (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
...to welcome our European overlords.
Thank you. Now Europeans!
Vorwärts!
En avant!
Adelante!
Avanti!
Eteenpäin!
And to the rest of you: onward!
Re:Let me be the first... (Score:4, Informative)
There are 23 official languages in the EU. And many more in Europe [wikipedia.org]. They'll be offended if you exclude them ;-)
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Re:Let me be the first... (Score:5, Insightful)
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...and Russian is one of them (Score:3, Informative)
There are 23 official languages in the EU. And many more in Europe [wikipedia.org].
Interestingly the article lists Russian as one of those European languages so either this should be the second European commander or the first commander from the EU.
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That's crazy! You also have to change each "ij" to "ei".
Russia... (Score:5, Insightful)
isn't part of Europe?
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gennady_Padalka [wikipedia.org]
But he's from the almost the furthest west bit (due south of Moscow)
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Its launches are all in Asia too.
Although, the European Space Agency's launches are all in South America...
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Yes, on the continent of South America but *in* the EU. French Guiana is part of France and therefore part of the EU.
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Historically, it's a province of Mongolia [wikipedia.org].
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By that logic, so is China, India, pretty much the whole Middle East, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia and so on.
Re:Russia... (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Russia... (Score:4, Interesting)
Frank De Winne of the EU is the first "European" commander (and all the Russian commanders don't count) in the same sense that people from the United States are "Americans" while people from Canada, Panama, Chile, etc. are not. It's not geographically accurate, but it's culturally/politically meaningful.
Parent
ESA NOT EU (Score:5, Informative)
The ESA is not a part of the European Union and includes member nations outside of the EU and even Europe! Norway and Switzerland are members of ESA but not the EU. And Canada is a member but is not a European country!
The European Space Agency (ESA), established in 1975, is an intergovernmental organisation dedicated to the exploration of space, currently with 18 member states.
Parent
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Technically Russia is part of Asia.
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In a nutshell: geographically, Russia is in Europe as it is west of the Urals. Politically, it is
We rule the ISS and IOC now :-) (Score:4, Funny)
A Belgian is now commander of the ISS and president of the IOC... and next year probably chairman of the UN Security Council :-)
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Ah crap. Now this guy and his 15 year old love slave will raise the ISS to be evil!!!
Commander of what precisely? (Score:5, Interesting)
What does being commander entail?
In an emergency I suppose someone would be responsible for barking orders.
But realistically everyone up there, (now that the Cirque du Soleil clown is gone) are professionals and scientific types, and virtually all work schedules are managed by ground support teams.
Commanders in such a working environment generally are cajolers rather than of commanders anyway, but with the working environment I can't see them having much real need of a commander on a day to day basis, other than to lobby ground controllers for workload changes, or more snacks in the next cargo ship.
I suppose if they are still bickering over who gets to use which toilet they might have selected the Euro guy to take the edge off the situation.
seriously... (Score:5, Insightful)
Something happens on the space station and for some reason the station cant communicate with earth...whos in charge?
The station commander.
In an emergency he would make certain decisions such abandon the station or stay put.
While ground controllers can give direction, you always want to have someone on site who can actually
act on those directions and tell people what to do. A station commander is not for things you expect, its for the things
you dont expect.
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Feeling Left Out (Score:5, Funny)
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And a major gripe in the European psyche is that we keep invading them and they never let us win!
That's just bad form, old chap, bad form.
Russian Identity (Score:4, Funny)
There is an old Russian joke that goes like this:
A guy dies and ends up in hell. Before his punishment is due, he's shown around to know what is awaiting for him. At one moment, he and his demonic guide pass by three large foul-smelling pits full of dung.
One pit is bustling with activity - people climb out there every minute or so in large groups, and there are several demons with pitchforks running around the pit pushing the climbers down. The demons are sweaty and obviously tired.
The second pit is mostly quiet, but occasionally a single guy pokes his head outside, and immediately gets pushed down by a young lone demon, who is otherwise standing there yawning.
The third pit is absolutely quiet. There is a very old demon with chipped horns lying near the edge snoring and cuddling his pitchfork in the sleep. However, no-one climbs out of the pit.
The guy looks at all this for some time, and then asks what it is all about. His guide explains:
"The first pit is for Jews. They always stick together and help each other, and as soon as one climbs one step above the others, he stops and helps them get up to his level.
The second pit is for Europeans. They're hardworking, but individualist and way too proud of themselves, so they all climb alone, each on his own.
The third pit is for Russians. As soon as one of them climbs even a little bit higher than the rest, those below him pull him down by the legs into the dung so that he knows his place."
Parent
Russia Is Clearly European (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you even been to Europe? Of course we consider Russians Europeans! There is no doubt about that! People from the Soviet Republics however are a different matter, and even within the present Russian Federation there are many ethnic peoples!
We sometimes make the distinction because they are so large and have gone through a tough time lately (from Soviet times to Putin). Imperial Russia was at the heart of Europe, and only the Soviet era changed that. St Petersburg was the crown of Russias European identity!
Slavs are Europeans no matter what country in Europe they come from. Slavs are not limited to Russia you know, from Serbia to Russia Eastern Europe is full of Slavic people(s).
I'm a European, specifically a Scandinavian, and we absolutely see Russians as Europeans.
Parent
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Two Different Ethnic Groups (Score:3, Informative)
Russians are NOT related to us Scandinavians in ANY way. Russians are Slavs, Scandinavians are Germanic people(s).
I doubt you Americans think of Scandinavia as part of North America? Did you not understand I was a non-Russian, Scandinavian? It says so clearly at the end of my message.
The last Czar did indeed have some Danish blood, that does not make the country, people or history Scandinavian. Unless you think the US is now part of Kenya due to Obama?
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That is not entirely correct. Russia was founded by and ruled by vikings (Rørik, who built the city of Holmgård - nowadays Great Novgorod - and started the first Russian king dynasty). His fellow vikings were the first ruling class and even today very common Russian first names have got scandinavian roots (like Oleg/Olga - Helge/Helga or Igor - Ingvar)
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Well, a right wing nutjob has normally got a very limited circle of acquaintances - other right wing nutjobs. So it wonders not that they think the same.
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What the hell are you talking about? All Slavic countries are in Europe, as are most of the Russian Slavs; most of the people living in the Asian part of Russia are, obviously, not Slavic.
I know it's shocking, but "Central Europe" and "Eastern Europe" are part of "Europe".
American Show (Score:2)
European Commander? (Score:3, Funny)
Isn't thata great? He is full of De Winne!
Does this mean (Score:2)
Civil Engineer (Score:2, Funny)
He received a Masters degree in telecommunications and civil engineering from the Royal Military Academy, Brussels, in 1984.
I have this image of him building the rest of the station with concrete. The slump test may not work so well in orbit.
His bio (Score:3, Informative)
I didn't check my tags above. Oh well. It's past my bed time....
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No (Score:2)
He's the second Belgian in space since Tin-TIn
Capitalization (Score:3, Informative)
His name is Frank de Winne, without the capital D. The D is only capitalized when his first name isn't written. So it's commander De Winne, or commander Frank de Winne.
Then again, I guess it's already impressive you guys put a space between "de" and "Winne".
Re:Capitalization (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, when you see a little "d" it is usually used for noble title. It has been influenced by the French "etiquette".
For the non-beneluxians. :-)
"De" in Dutch means literally "the". for example: Jan De Boer (John the Farmer), Jacques De Ridder (Jacques the rider/the knight), etc. When you see names like Van Den Berg (it means from the hills), Jean-Claude Van Damme (Jean-Claude from Damme -> a Belgian town).
There is no form of nobility in those names so you use capital letters.
On the other hand: The King is in French "Albert de Belgique" or in Dutch "Albert van België").
Parent
Even Russians have a mixed view of Europe (Score:2, Interesting)
Offensive? I'd think a lot of Russians would be insulted if you said they were European. There's a long and mixed tradition of Russia wanting to be a part of Europe and wanting to be something else. On one hand, you have Peter the Great, and subsequent czars, who thought Europe was the cats meow. Then, on the other hand, there's plenty of people that worked for the czar, that thought speaking french in court was a bunch of crap and that europeans sucked anyway. As it is, I think the Russians would pref
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I remember your posts, and I think you're a right-wing nutjob. ;-)
But I agree, we don't like Russia, but we respect Russia. Some of us like Europe, but we definitely don't respect Europe.
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geographically russia is both in europe and asia
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Owned and hosted by US companies, sure. American site? Only insofar are there are any boundaries on this new-fangled interweb thingo, which is to say, it isn't. You want a US-only site, stop serving to the world (precisely what ./ers tell Murdoch to do with Google), and while you're at it, stop using news from the rest of the world.
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Some Americans are really wound up, originally the domain addressing without a country of origin ie .com versus , com.us were and are specifically defined as international. It is only after the republicans wanted to take over the international domains and portray themselves as the imperialistic world government enforcing it's rule, the rule of violent force using it's global military ie. a massive self driven ego trip. In fact to this day if you add .us on any American government web address it points now