In 1964, Sangam, Raj Kapoor’s first colour Hindi film, captured the hearts and imaginations of many young Indians, including a young Ravi Margasahayam. With flight as a central theme, the film inspired a dream he would realise more than two decades later, some 15,000 kilometres from Mumbai, at the world-renowned NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration).
The journey of Dr Ravi Margasahayam from modest beginnings in Mumbai and unremarkable school performance to attaining one of the highest positions at NASA, contributing to more than 100 space shuttle launches and having his photograph displayed in the $250 million museum dedicated to Space Shuttle Atlantis at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre Visitor Complex is a remarkable testament to passion, perseverance and commitment to excellence.
Early Life
Born in 1953 to a civil engineer father and homemaker mother, Dr Ravi grew up exposed to different cultures and environments. His father, an Indian engineer recruited for postwar UN construction projects in Myanmar, later worked on a US Embassy project in Kabul, Afghanistan. This exposure nurtured Ravi’s curiosity and determination to explore the world.
A shy, introverted student, Dr Ravi struggled academically and performed poorly in his SSLC examinations in Mumbai. After completing Intermediate Science, he moved to Bangalore in 1970, where the competitive environment at RV College of Engineering (RVCE) inspired him to excel. He eventually secured second rank in Mechanical Engineering at Bangalore University.
In Pursuit
After earning his B.E. degree, he moved to Oman, where his father had established himself. Finding few career opportunities, he accepted an aunt’s invitation to visit the United States. What began as a six-week visit became a life-changing journey. “I arrived in Chicago in December, in chilly weather, with no proper winter clothes, no money, no books, and no clear idea of what to do”, Dr Ravi recalls.
At a family gathering, his aunt, Dr Sheila Sangoram, introduced him to an acquaintance who connected him with Dr Sudhir Kumar at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). This chance encounter enabled him to enrol and begin a new chapter.
The early years were difficult. Unfamiliar with the weather, culture, and language, he took whatever work was available, including jobs at a Mexican restaurant and welding shops, to support himself while studying. “I could not understand the American accent at first. It took me some time to become acquainted with it,” he recalls.
After earning his master’s degree in 1977 (and his PhD years later), Dr Ravi gained diverse engineering experience, working first in the mining industry and later on military helicopters at Boeing. These roles broadened his expertise and prepared him for a greater opportunity in aerospace engineering at NASA.
Two years after the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster in 1986, Dr Ravi applied to NASA. Asked about his rocket experience during the interview, he jokingly replied, “Having lit rocket crackers during the Diwali festival in Mumbai was the only rocket experience I knew!”
He explained that every engineering structure, whether a car, railway system, or aeroplane, experiences vibration, and that his expertise as a vibration specialist could be applied to complex problems at NASA. His confidence and ability to think beyond conventional boundaries impressed the interviewers, leading to his appointment at NASA and the beginning of a remarkable career.
The Firsts
In 1989, Dr Ravi became the first Indian-born engineer to work at launchpad LC-39A, from which Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins had embarked on their historic journey to the Moon. His responsibility was highly specialised and critical. Working within 100 meters of the launchpad, he monitored the vibrations generated by rockets weighing nearly 250 million kilograms as they prepared to lift off.
This highly specialised field, known as vibroacoustics, demanded extraordinary precision, experience, and technical judgement. As an expert in noise and vibration, he was the only engineer at NASA permitted to install his monitoring devices on the launch site.
On one occasion, with just 1.5 seconds remaining before launch, he detected an anomaly in the vibration readings and had to make the crucial decision to call off the launch. In those few seconds, there was no room for hesitation or error.
Looking back, he recalls that only one other person at NASA had comparable expertise in this highly specialised field. He dedicated more than three decades of his professional life to this field, contributing his knowledge and experience to some of the most demanding challenges in American human space exploration.
The Opened Space
In his very first year at NASA, he played vital roles in launching probes to the Sun (Ulysses), Venus (Magellan), Jupiter (Galileo) and Saturn (Cassini). He was also a core member of the team that launched the Hubble Space Telescope and was part of the team that built the International Space Station (ISS).
He worked on numerous programs, including Space Shuttle, Atlas, Delta, Titan, X-33, EELV, HLLV, STARDUST, and ARES 1-X. In the years that followed, he supported more than 100 manned space shuttle rocket launches, sending more than 700 astronauts into space.
In 1996, he won the Silver Snoopy Award, presented by NASA astronaut Pamela Melroy, who later became his mentor.
The Indian Connection
Another Indian, Kalpana Chawla, was selected as an astronaut in 1994 and began her training soon afterwards. During a visit to the Kennedy Space Centre, the two met for the first time.
In 1997, NASA selected Kalpana for the STS-87 mission aboard Space Shuttle Columbia. Dr Ravi was part of the team that trained her in terminal countdown demonstration test (TCDT) and emergency escape procedures.
At the request of the Government of India, Dr Ravi negotiated with the NASA Administrator to enable the then Prime Minister of India, I.K. Gujral, to speak with Kalpana once she was in space. An hour-long conversation followed, broadcast to millions of Indians across the country, a moment Dr Ravi recalls with great pride and a historic milestone in Indo-US cooperation. PM also commented that she was the first Indian woman to break the space ceiling and thanked Dr Ravi and his team at NASA.
During a visit to NASA, former President Dr A.P.J. Abdul Kalam jokingly remarked to Dr Ravi’s father, “I am envious of your son. I wanted to launch an Indian woman or man into space; I could not do it, but your son has managed.” He quipped, “Your son is the real Astronaut Maker of NASA”.
Kalpana Chawla was selected again for a space mission aboard Space Shuttle Columbia for STS-107 in 2003. Tragically, the shuttle disintegrated during re-entry over Texas, killing Kalpana and the other crew members. She was a long-term friend and colleague of Dr Ravi, who, with great emotion, recalls being the last person to see her before the ill-fated launch.
As a lasting tribute, NASA has displayed a photograph of Kalpana Chawla with Dr Ravi in the Atlantis exhibit at the museum. A classic tale of two humans who began their journeys in India and met at NASA now has a place in space history, sharing space together in a museum dedicated to exploration, aptly named Forever Remembered.
Mission Continues
Since retiring from NASA, Dr Ravi has remained professionally active, lecturing and mentoring students worldwide. He has spoken at 250 universities across seven continents, inspiring young people to pursue careers in space research and travel.
Former astronaut and director of the Kennedy Space Centre, Dr Roy Bridges, aptly described him as a “Goodwill Space Ambassador,” while NASA astronaut Pamela Melroy stated that Dr Ravi was “the Greatest Citizen of the World”, a fitting description for a man who once dreamt of looking at the skies from Mumbai and went on to make that dream a reality.
His message to society is simple: never assume that something is not achievable. Failure is merely a detour on the way to the destination, so never give up. His ultimate legacy is one of extending humanity’s reach into the cosmos by living, working and inspiring others to reach for space on the International Space Station (ISS), recently visited by Indian Astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla.
