Lots of people want to be an astronaut, but few are chosen.

When I started pursuing it, I realized that it was the perfect job for me.

It was the greatest job ever invented and I also realized that it was

impossible to get this job. It was going to be really difficult. It's Tuesday

December 12th but just between us it's Science Friday.

I'm Cyfry producer Charles Berquist.

The odds of becoming an astronaut aren't good.

In 2021, NASA selected 10 astronaut candidates from a pool of over 12,000 applicants.

And that's before the training starts.

Ira Flato and Flora Lickman talk with former NASA astronaut Mike Masimino about his path to the launch pad and how what he learned there can apply on Earth.

For all of you who wanted to grow up to be an astronaut and didn't make it, which could be 99% of you.

We have one an astronaut with us who actually achieved that dream.

Mike Massimino is a professor of mechanical engineering at Columbia University, a former NASA astronaut.

He's been to space twice on the shuttle, has logged over 30 hours of space walking time,

and he's author of a new book Moonshot, a NASA astronaut's

guide to achieving the impossible. He's here in our New York studios. Welcome back to

Science Friday. Irish, back to Science Friday.

I got to say that it's not every day that I get to chat with someone who graduated

the same high school, H. Frank Carey High School in Franklin Square, New York, as I did.

Unbelievable. We both ended up being science people.

Isn't that amazing? Yeah. Yeah.

All right, let's get into the book. Why an astronaut do you write a book like this one, which is really a motivational book, if I might say so?

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