17 North Beach Street
Nantucket, MA 02554
(508) 228-1515
DOWN TO EARTH
Astronaut Daniel Bursch's lightship baskets in orbit.
It was 1969 when 11-year-old Daniel Bursch saw a glimpse of his future. He was at summer camp, propped up against the radio, listening as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon. “That was the first time I thought, ‘Oh, that might be something I could do … to become an astronaut,’” he says. “That started the spark.” Fast forward 55 years and Bursch is now a retired NASA astronaut and U.S. Navy captain living between California and his family cottage in Tom Nevers on Nantucket. During his NASA career, which began in 1990 after first serving in the Navy, he launched into space four times—one of which included six and a half months on the International Space Station (ISS). “On my first flight I remember being up there and just having to pinch myself as we flew over the Earth at five miles a second,” he says.
Bursch continues, “When I first looked out the window, we were still climbing. The engines had cut off, and we were at about 80 miles coasting up, eventually to orbit around 200 miles above the Earth. Looking out the window, it reminded me of the old Star Trek movies as the starship Enterprise entered orbit around a planet. I could easily see the curvature of the Earth out the front windows of the space shuttle.”
During his ISS training, which started in 1997, Bursch was told that he could bring a hobby with him. “They kept us fairly busy on the space station, but it was a unique experience. I think a lot of people felt isolated during COVID-19, and it was very similar in some ways that there were only three of us on the space station most of the time,” he explains. “So you needed something to relax and do—something totally different than your current work.”
For the Northeast native who grew up summering on Nantucket at his
grandmother’s house in Sconset, it was basket weaving that kept him going while on his missions. “It became very helpful and soothing when I was up there,” he says. But how does a naval officer turned astronaut learn basket weaving? It was a love story, of sorts, to his mother, who had never owned a lightship basket despite her many years of coming to Nantucket. So, in the early 1990s, Bursch decided to give it a try. From there, the rest is history.
Logistically, bringing the basket weaving materials to his missions was easy, except for the box cutter knife, which Bursch had to convince NASA to let him bring due to his experience in the craft.
Then it was figuring out how to weave in weightlessness, which required him to wet the weavers with drops of water on his fingers while using a straw with a clamp to keep the rest of the water still. “Your body is learning how to adapt to weightlessness,” he explains of his time in space. “And it takes a while to get used to moving around when you’re weightless. That, itself, is physically challenging.”
He certainly got the hang of it—during his 196 days aboard the ISS (December 2001 to June 2002) as the flight engineer for Expedition 4, he wove approximately 36 baskets—12 sets of miniature nests of three. Since he has retired, one of those nests has been on display at the Nantucket Lightship Basket Museum as well as the Nantucket Memorial Airport. They are currently on display at the Hadwen House.
While Bursch is no longer spending time in space, his fascination with outer space continues. Last year, he was a part of the Science Speaker Series at the Maria Mitchell Association. Since then, he has continued to assist at the Open Night and Look Up! programs at the Loines Observatory. In addition, Bursch published a children’s nighttime book, Up to the Moon, with his wife, Sharon Yencharis. They plan on publishing three others in a series that will cover other adventures. He says, “I’m a big fan of education, and whether it’s future astronomers or future scientists or future explorers, I want to help them to pursue whatever they want.”
Latest Stories
