The late NASA scientist and astronaut Piers Sellers.
Credits: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Rebecca Roth
Piers J. Sellers, the late NASA scientist and astronaut, was granted the Space Foundation’s General James E. Hill Lifetime Space Achievement Award at the foundation’s 33rd Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Sellers worked as a climate scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, in the 1980s and 1990s before joining NASA’s astronaut corps in 1996. In 2011, Sellers returned to science, and worked in multiple leadership positions in Goddard’s Sciences & Exploration Directorate. Sellers died in December 2016, about a year after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.
The Hill lifetime achievement award, created in 2002, is the Space Foundation’s highest honor, named after the organization’s late chairman, retired Gen. James E. Hill, U.S. Air Force. According to the foundation, the award “recognizes outstanding individuals who have distinguished themselves through lifetime contributions to humankind through exploration, development and use of space.” Previous NASA winners include Neil Armstrong, Sally Ride and Buzz Aldrin, among others.
On Sellers’ behalf, Colleen Hartman, director of NASA Goddard’s Sciences and Exploration Directorate, accepted the award from Space Foundation board chairman retired Adm. James O. Ellis Jr., U.S. Navy, at a ceremony on April 5.
“I never met a single man, woman or child who didn’t instantly fall in love with Piers,” Hartman said. “He was a force of nature defending our fragile Earth. It is our American exceptionalism which demands that we make sure the Earth Piers defended remains a great place to live for the entire world.”
According to the Space Foundation, Sellers was nominated for the honor by British space journalist and broadcaster Sarah Cruddas, and was endorsed by British media personality Carol Vorderman and former NASA astronauts Garrett Reisman, Kenneth Ham, Michael Good and Gregory Johnson.
In a December 2016 statement announcing the award, released shortly before Sellers died, Admiral Ellis said, “Dr. Sellers is an incredibly accomplished and highly regarded scientist, astronaut and author who has made superb contributions to his science, been a treasured friend and teammate to his astronaut colleagues, and, quietly and professionally, through his observation and study of our planet, benefited us all.
“[Sellers] spent much of his professional life studying our Earth’s climate and has devoted himself to analyzing and communicating the nature of climate change and why action matters,” Ellis said. “Not long after receiving the cancer diagnosis, Dr. Sellers, showing extraordinary courage and true humanity, said: ‘As an astronaut I spacewalked 220 miles above the Earth. Floating alongside the International Space Station, I watched hurricanes cartwheel across oceans, the Amazon snake its way to the sea through a brilliant green carpet of forest, and gigantic nighttime thunderstorms flash and flare for hundreds of miles along the Equator. From this God’s-eye-view, I saw how fragile and infinitely precious the Earth is. I’m hopeful for its future. And so, I’m going to work tomorrow.’ Dr. Sellers is an incredibly optimistic man with tremendous faith in people and their ability to bring about positive change. We are honored to have the opportunity to recognize him for his lifetime of achievement.”
Born in Great Britain, Sellers studied ecology at the University of Edinburgh and earned a doctorate in biometeorology at the University of Leeds. He arrived at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in 1982 and began research on the challenges of understanding and simulating the complex interactions between Earth’s atmosphere and biosphere. Sellers led the work that created the first realistic computer model of how the biosphere interacts with Earth’s climate, and helped lead major field campaigns to combine ground, airborne and satellite measurements of photosynthesis.
For more about Sellers’ career at NASA, please visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/piers-sellers-a-legacy-of-science
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/piers-sellers-1955-2016