Two employees at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, were recently awarded the Silver Award, a prestigious award given to NASA employees and contractors across NASA for outstanding achievements related to astronaut safety and mission success. It won the Snoopy Award. Dr. Shih-Yung Lin and Dr. Peter Parker received the award at the Space Flight Awareness (SFA) awards ceremony in Langley on November 21st. Mr. Lin received this award for his outstanding engineering and technical leadership contributions to the Orion program. Mr. Parker received this award for outstanding leadership and technical contributions in support of the International Space Station (ISS).
NASA astronaut Victor Glover visited Langley to present the award. Glover is currently assigned as the pilot for NASA’s Artemis II mission to the moon. He served as a pilot on the SpaceX Crew 1 mission to the International Space Station in 2018 and as a flight engineer on Expeditions 64 and 65.
“To me, this is similar to the feeling you get when you receive your astronaut pin. This is our team pin for you,” Glover said. He later added: “This is something you should wear with honor. You are a very special part of our culture of safety and mission assurance.”
The Silver Snoopy is an individual award for astronauts and is given to less than 1% of NASA employees each year. The honorees did not forget the importance of this award and brought their families to share in the moment.
“I’m involved in a lot of research projects, and not all of them involve loss of life,” Parker said. “It’s definitely the more prestigious, more impactful, more consequential types of projects that I’m being recognized for.”
Mr. Lin, who recently retired, echoed similar sentiments.
“You have set very high standards to achieve the safest conditions for all astronauts,” he said. “For me, if I get a good mission out of it, or I get more than one mission, I consider that a personal lifelong goal for my career. That’s what it means to me.”
Lynn and Parker each received a sterling silver Snoopy lapel pin from space, as well as a certificate of appreciation and a certificate signed by Grover. The pin, awarded to the Langley Award winner, flew aboard Space Shuttle Endeavor during an assembly mission to the International Space Station STS-118 from August 8 to 21, 2007. The award depicts Snoopy, a character from the Peanuts cartoon by Charles Schulz. .
An avid supporter of the U.S. space program, Mr. Schultz gave permission to NASA astronauts during the Apollo era to adopt Snoopy as a personal safety symbol, and was instrumental in the success of spaceflight missions to ensure the success of NASA missions. We have a longstanding commitment to promoting excellence at every step. The Snoopy emblem reflects NASA and industry’s commitment to and continued concern for the safety of astronaut flight.
