Washington state legislators got an introduction to the state’s space industry today at Seattle’s Museum of Flight – and voiced amazement at how much is going on.
“I feel so illiterate in this field, it’s unbelievable,” state Sen. Mike Hewitt, R-Walla Walla, remarked at one point during today’s meeting of the Legislative Committee on Economic Development and International Relations. Afterward, Hewitt said he knew “100 percent” more about the field than he did at the start of the hearing.
State Sen. Maralyn Chase, D-Shoreline, marveled when she heard Aerojet Rocketdyne executive Roger Myers list all the missions his company in which his company has played a part, ranging from the Apollo missions to the moon, to the space shuttle program, to robotic missions that have visited every planet (yes, including Pluto).
“I would wager that most of the people in this state do not know what you’re doing in Redmond,” Chase told Myers.
That was the point of today’s hearing, presided over by Lt. Gov. Brad Owen: to let legislators know that there’s much more than Boeing to the state’s profile in the aerospace industry.
