Ilan Ramon Had Moon Landscape Drawing by Petr Ginz on Columbia Shuttle

Summary: First Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon had a copy of Auschwitz teenage victim Petr Ginz's Moon Landscape on Space Shuttle Columbia's last, fatal flight.

First Israeli astronaut Ilan Roman, with photo of half-Jewish, half-Christian, Czechoslovakian artist, editor and writer Petr Ginz (left) and copy of the artistic and literary teenager's "Moon Landscape" onboard Space Shuttle Columbia: Stolpersteine Prague, via Facebook Jan. 31, 2019

First Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon had a copy of Moon Landscape, drawn ca. 1942 to 1944, by Auschwitz teenage victim Petr Ginz, onboard Columbia during the U.S. space shuttle's last, fatal flight, Thursday, Jan. 16, to Saturday, Feb. 1, 2003.

Israeli fighter pilot and first Israeli astronaut Ilan (Hebrew: אילן, i'lan, "tree") Ramon (Hebrew: רמון, ra'mon) was born Sunday, June 20, 1954, as Ilan Wolferman in the Ramat Hen neighborhood of Diamond Exchange District and high-technology city of Ramat Gan (Hebrew: רָמַת גַּן) in central coastal Israel's Tel Aviv District (Hebrew: מחוז תל אביב, Mechoz Tel Aviv; Arabic: منطقة تل أبيب, mintaqat tal'abib). He was the second son of Ashkenazi Jewish couple Eliezer Wolferman (1923–2006), born in Germany and immigration (aliyah; Hebrew: עֲלִיָּה, ʿaliyya, "ascent") to Mandatory Palestine (April 25, 1920-midnight, May 14/15, 1948) in 1935, and Tonya Kreppel Wolferman (1929–2003), born in Poland, survived the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camps during the Holocaust (Jan 30, 1933-May 8, 1945) and immigrated, with her Auschwitz-surviving mother, to the State of Israel in 1949.

Eliezer's work replacement in 1962 occasioned the family's relocation to Be'er-Sheva (Hebrew: בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע, Bəʾer Sevaʿ; Arabic: بئر السبع, Biʾr as-Sabʿ, "Well of the Oath or Well of the Seven"; English: Beersheba or Beer Sheva), the administrative, largest city in southern Israel's Negev (Hebrew: הַנֶּגֶב, hanNegev; Arabic: ٱلنَّقَب, an-Naqab; English: Negeb or Negev) region, according to Honor Israel's Fallen website. Eliezer began working at the Dimona Nuclear Reactor (Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center; Hebrew: קריה למחקר גרעיני – נגב ע"ש שמעון פרס; formerly the Negev Nuclear Research Center), located southeast of Beersheba, according to Connecticut-born Israeli journalist Barbara Sofer (born April 13, 1949) in Ilan Ramon: Israel's Space Hero (pages 7-8), published in 2004.

Ilan graduated from Beersheba's Makif Gimel High School in 1972. At the beginning of August 1972 he enlisted in the Israeli Air Force (IAF; Hebrew: זְרוֹעַ הָאֲוִיר וְהֶחָלָל, Zroa HaAvir VeHahalal, "Air and Space Arm") to fulfill his military requirement (Honor Israel's Fallen Heroes website). He attended IAF Flight School at Hatzerim Israeli Air Force Base (Hebrew: בָּסִיס חֵיל-הַאֲוִויר חֲצֵרִים, Basis Heil HaAvir Hatzerim), located on Beersheba's western outskirts, according to Brooklyn, New York-born, Jerusalem-resident journalist and researcher Alan D. Abbey in Journey of Hope: The Story of Ilan Ramon, Israel's First Astronaut (page 10), published in 2003.

After graduating from IAF Flight School in 1974, Ilan Hebraized his surname from Wolferman to Roman. He selected letters "r," "m" and "n" from his family name to form Ramon, thereby recalling Ramon Crater (Makhtesh Ramon; Hebrew: מכתש רמון; ramon makhtesh; Arabic: وادي الرمان, wadi al-ruman, "Ruman river valley"), the multicolored erosion cirque south of Beersheba where Ilan's high school class had enjoyed overnight hikes (Barbara Sofer, pages 14-15, 19). Adopting Hebrew surnames conformed with an administrative order issued in 1948 to officers of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF; Hebrew: צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל, Tsva ha-Hagana le-Yisra'el, "The Army of Defense for Israel") by David Ben-Gurion (born David Grün; Hebrew: דָּוִד בֶּן־גּוּר16 Oct. 16, 1886-Dec. 1, 1973), the first prime minister (May 14, 1948-Jan. 26, 1954) of the State of Israel, as explained by Philologos in "How and Why Jews Hebraized Their Family Names at the Founding of Israel," published in the April 25, 2018, issue of Mosaic magazine.

Ilan paused his military career from 1983 to 1987 to attend Tel Aviv University (TAU; Hebrew: אוּנִיבֶרְסִיטַת תֵּל אָבִיב, Universitat Tel Aviv). He graduated in 1983 with a bachelor's degree in electronics and computer engineering. While pursuing his degree, Ilan married Rona Bar-Siman-Tov (Rona Ramon; Hebrew: רונה רמו; April 16, 1964-Dec. 17, 2018) on Thursday, Oct. 16, 1986.

In 1988, Ilan resumed his military career. That same year, Assaf (Feb. 10, 1988-Sep. 13, 2009) was born as the first of the couple's four children, according to American children's and young adult author Tanya Lee Stone (born 1969) in Ilan Ramon, Israel's first astronaut (page 12), published in 2003. Tal and Yiftah were born, respectively, on April 7, 1990, and June 25, 1993, as the couple's second and third sons. Noa, born May 27, 1997, numbered as the couple's first daughter and fourth child.

"STS-107 Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut, takes a break during training on the operation of an M113 armored personnel carrier during Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test activities, a standard part of launch preparations"; Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2002, image taken at John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC), east central coastal Florida; NASA ID KSC-02pd1931: Not subject to copyright, via NASA Image and Video Library

In April 1997, the month before Noa's birth, Ilan learned that he had been selected to train as a payload specialist, carrying out scientific and technological experiments on space flights, in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) space program as Israel's first astronaut (Tanya Lee Stone, page 13). In 1988, the family relocated to Houston, southeastern Texas, for Ilan's astronaut training, which began at NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) in July, according to NASA's official crew profile.

Ilan Ramon's first and only experience of outer space began with the launching of Space Shuttle Columbia on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2003, at 10:39 a.m. Eastern Standard Time from John F. Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39 on northern Merritt Island, Brevard County, east central coastal Florida. STS-107 (Space Transportation System-107) numbered as the 113th flight of the Space Shuttle program, NASA's fourth human spaceflight program, and as the space shuttle orbiter's 28th mission.

Ilan's responsibilities as payload specialist included functioning as the prime crewmember for the Mediterranean Israeli Dust Experiment (MEIDEX), a multispectral camera measuring dust aerosols, i.e., small dust particles, in the atmosphere above the Mediterranean Sea and the Saharan coast of the Atlantic Ocean, according to his official Columbia crew profile. The MEIDEX cameras and sensors also recorded sprites, lightning phenomena that appear as bursts of light over large thunderstorms and that reach upward in the sky simultaneously with ground-directed lightning flashes, according to NASAfacts "Mediterranean Israel Dust Experiment (MEIDEX)." The joint Israel Space Agency-NASA experiment is credited with the image capture of ". . . the first two sprites ever seen from space. Since then, cameras aboard the International Space Station have captured sprites in action."

Ilan Ramon is credited with time in space at 15 days 22 hours 20 minutes, all earned onboard the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Space Shuttle Columbia. He emphasized his status as Israel's first astronaut with a Holocaust-commemorating artifact that he chose from an array of Holocaust-related Jewish relics offered by Yad Vashem (Hebrew: יָד וַשֵׁם; "a memorial and a name"), the World Holocaust Remembrance Center located on western Jerusalem's Mount Herzl (Hebrew: הַר הֶרְצְל, Har Hertsl).

"Moon Landscape" was a copy of a pencil drawing of a view of Earth from a rugged lunar landscape imagined ca. 1942 to 1944 by half-Jewish, half-Christian, Czechoslovakian Petr Ginz (Feb. 1, 1928-Sep. 28, 1944). On Thursday, Oct. 22, 1942, the precocious 14-year-old learned that he was scheduled for transport that evening from his hometown of Prague (Czech: Praha) to Theresienstadt Ghetto, a ghetto and extermination camp waystation in the town of Terezín, about 40 kilometers north of Prague, according to Amanda Zolan and Kimberly Mann in The Last Flight of Petr Ginz: Study Guide (pages 17-18), published by the United Nations in 2012. He resided in the ghetto's Home Number One of Barrack L417 until his deportation on Thursday, Sep. 28, 1944, to the Auschwitz concentration camp complex in Nazi Germany-occupied southern Poland.

Space Shuttle Columbia was scheduled to return to Earth Saturday, Feb. 1, 2003. "The STS-107 mission ended abruptly on February 1, 2003 when Space Shuttle Columbia and the crew perished during entry, 16 minutes before scheduled landing," states Ilan Ramon's official Columbia Crew Biography, dated February 2003.

The deaths of Ilan Ramon and his six astronaut colleagues occurred 75 years after Petr Ginz's birth. The artistic and literary teenage Holocaust victim was born on Feb. 1, 1928.

In 1938 Petr Ginz (left) strolls on Na Příkopě, a wide street separating central Prague's Old Town and New Town, with his sister Eva, known today as Chava Pressburger; his Jewish father, Ota; his Christian mother, Marie Ginzová Ginz; Petr's father and sister both survived their internments in Terezín's Theresienstadt Ghetto: Stolpersteine Prague, via Facebook. Feb. 1, 2023

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

First Israeli astronaut Ilan Roman, with photo of half-Jewish, half-Christian, Czechoslovakian artist, editor and writer Petr Ginz (left) and copy of the artistic and literary teenager's "Moon Landscape" onboard Space Shuttle Columbia: Stolpersteine Prague, via Facebook Jan. 31, 2019, @ https://www.facebook.com/stolpersteineprague/posts/389165951646260/

"STS-107 Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut, takes a break during training on the operation of an M113 armored personnel carrier during Terminal Countdown Demonstration Test activities, a standard part of launch preparations"; Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2002, image taken at John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC), east central coastal Florida; NASA ID KSC-02pd1931: Not subject to copyright, via NASA Image and Video Library @ https://images.nasa.gov/details/KSC-02pd1931

In 1938, Petr Ginz (left) strolls on Na Příkopě, a wide street separating central Prague's Old Town and New Town, with his sister Eva, known today as Chava Pressburger; his Jewish father, Ota; his Christian mother, Marie Ginzová Ginz; Petr's father and sister both survived their internments in Terezín's Theresienstadt Ghetto: Stolpersteine Prague, via Facebook. Feb. 1, 2023, @ https://www.facebook.com/stolpersteineprague/photos/a.296011377628385/659482632849060/

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