NASA Group Achievement Award - Sarah Arnac
| Event Date: | March 13, 2013 |
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Congratulations to Sarah Arnac who has been awarded a NASA Group Achievement Award. The award is in appreciation for Sarah's participation in the Mars Science Laboratory Dryden Flight Research Center Team. She provided exemplary performance in the successful execution of challenging ground operations and flight maneuvers for the Mars Science Laboratory radar system.
Serving as the primer flight test center for NASA, the Dryden team provided a critical collaborative effort to test the landing radar system for Curiosity, the latest Mars rover of NASA. Dryden testing included suspending a full-scale engineering model of the rover from a helicopter to simulate lowering the rover onto the Martian surface. Follow-on high-speed testing used an F/A-18 to simulate the entry into the Martian atmosphere with the radar’s environmental control hardware mounted in an external pod. This effort helped ensure the success of the Mars rover landing in August of 2012.
Kate Pavlock, Deputy Branch Chief, Operations Engineering, NASA Dryden Flight Research Center, has worked with Sarah for several co-op rotations and stated that Sarah does not concern herself with recognition, but she strives to be worthy of recognition and that Sarah’s undeniable technical, critical thinking and teamwork skills provided significant value to this effort.