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Tavis: Alvin Drew is a former U.S. Air Force combat pilot who is now an astronaut with NASA. Soon, he leaves for Russia. In fact, today he leaves for Russia to continue his training for a future mission, but tonight, we find him at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Astronaut Drew, nice to have you on the program, sir.

Alvin Drew: I'm glad to be here.

Tavis: I'm glad to have you here. Let me start by telling you-- This is my own little shout-out to my dad. My dad, Emory G. Smiley, retired from the air force after 37 years just months ago, as a matter of fact. So I got love for anybody in the air force, and I especially have love for brothers and sisters who are in NASA. I respect everybody at NASA, all the persons there, but I'm particularly intrigued by African Americans who find themselves at NASA, so tell me your story. How did a brother from Washington, D.C., grew up in the city, end up in the NASA program?

Alvin: Well, it started when I was 6 years old, Mr. Smiley. I was watching TV in the school one day. My principal came in and stopped class, turned on the TV set, so we could watch the Apollo 7 launch, and I watched that, and it looked exciting.

First off, it got me out of math that day, and I was glad to do that. But to watch these folks take a rocket and fly into the sky just intrigued me, and so I started following the program with an interest. And that summer between first and second grade, I watched the crew from Apollo 11 land on the moon, and it occurred to me that I might get to do this someday, and this sure beat working'.

So I decided maybe I'd set out and try and do that someday, and people told me then I needed to hit the books. I needed to study. I needed to learn math and science and English, virtually everything I was studying, and from that point, it stopped being just a drudge getting through school. I was preparing myself to go in space.

Now, I got older and a little bit more realistic and thought that was kind of a pipe dream, but I kept going through school because by that time, I'd developed a passion for science and gotten a degree in engineering, went to the Air Force Academy where they re-ignited that inspiration. Folks there told me if I had gotten a degree in engineering or science and I'd gone off to become a pilot in the air force, there was a chance I could become a test pilot, and at that point, almost all the astronauts in the corps were test pilots. That got me excited again. I got back into the books. I got through school and went off to pilot training, and sure enough, 8 years later, I got to go to test pilot school, and in 2000, I got to join the astronaut corps.

Tavis: Here's my burning question after that wonderful story. Did you ever grow to actually like math?

Alvin: Yes, I did, as a matter of fact. Once we got past the basic arithmetic part, and we got into word problems, it started to get exciting. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that, but, yes.

Tavis: Yeah, well, I'm not embarrassed to admit that I never did like it. I flunked it every year. That's why I'm on television and not at NASA, but I digress on that point. Let me ask you what I suspect for many is an obvious question. No matter how much one loves the notion of outer space and loves space travel and loves exploring galaxies, I guess the obvious question these days is, are you scared? Are you at all scared about what it means to travel in outer space, and I suspect many people are interested in your answer to that question.

Alvin: I think anybody who isn't at least a little bit worried about space flight, especially if you're going up on that rocket, doesn't quite understand what's going on. There's danger involved. When we interviewed to become astronauts, astronaut John Young, who has been an astronaut as long as I've been alive and flew on the first Gemini mission in space and also flew the very first space shuttle mission, stood up and told us that any one flight in space on the space shuttle is as dangerous as 60 combat missions during wartime. And I had an appreciation for how dangerous that was, so I knew that there was danger involved, and you understand that NASA and everybody else tries their best to manage that danger, and you go about it in a calculated way, but you never--you keep that in your mind because that keeps you on your toes to keep accidents at bay.

Tavis: Speaking about going about it in a very calculated way, you and I are obviously two different people, but if somebody told me that going into outer space was more dangerous than 60 combat missions, I think that I would calculate myself right on out of that equation. So how does one process--I mean, on a personal level, you know? Let's set the NASA thing aside. You're being a wonderful astronaut and representative of the program. On a personal, human level, how do you process that and still say, 'I want to go forward with this opportunity'?

Alvin: Well, first off, I'm foolish enough to have flown combat missions before. Between the invasion of Panama and the first Gulf war, I've got about 90 combat missions under my belt, so again, I understand how dangerous those missions are, but then again, if I was foolish enough to do those things, I think I'm foolish enough to fly in space.

Tavis: Yeah. How foolish of you was it, or how smart of you was it, to let People magazine name you as one of their most eligible bachelors?

Alvin: It's been an interesting experience since then.

Tavis: I always loved that word 'interesting.' I love that word 'interesting.'

Alvin: Well, it was just a shock to me because most often we do interviews with different trade magazines and other things, but nothing quite as big as People magazine. And the lady who was interviewing me warned me and said, 'Now, we have 38 million different subscribers. It's gonna be a little bit more than 15 minutes of fame you can expect from this.' And I just didn't appreciate it until it happened. The day that the magazine came out, I had gone over to Russia, so I was over in Moscow thinking that was something that was going to be contained within the United States, and there on the Moscow Morning News was my name and my face being announced among the 50 top bachelors. That's when it finally occurred to me the scope of what I had stepped into.

Tavis: Yeah, I was in there a few years ago, and I'm still single, so I hope it works out better for you.

Alvin: Well, all the astronauts who preceded me as bachelors in People magazine are all still single as well.

Tavis: Let me ask you--and I guess I can't use this line since I'm on television every day. I guess people would know I was lying about it. But for you, how does that line work when you meet a woman and you say-- she says, 'What do you do?' And you say, 'Well, I'm an astronaut'? How does that line go over with women?

Alvin: I don't recommend it to you. It doesn't work very well. The last time I used that line, I was asked to produce identification proving that I was an astronaut.

Tavis: So, you're working on--you've got some new material you're working on?

Alvin: Oh, yeah, but I don't want to let that out.

Tavis: I'm not gonna ask you to put it out there now. You know, you gotta try it out first, and then let me know how it works. If you find something that works, then you let a brother know.

Alvin: I'll let you know.

Tavis: You let me know. You let me know. I mentioned earlier, you're off to Russia today. Why Russia? What happens over there? Why are you headed there to train for space travel under an American program called NASA? Why go to Russia?

Alvin: Well, one of the things NASA participates in is the International Space Station. We have 19 different countries that participate in that, and of those, two of us, Russia and the United States, we launch vehicles with people--astronauts and cosmonauts--up to the space station.

Since February of 2003, our shuttle fleet's been grounded, so virtually all the astronauts and the cosmonauts that have gone to the space station have gone up on Russian Soyez rockets, and they launch out of Kazakhstan, one of the former Soviet republics. All the training goes on over in Star City, Russia, in the suburbs of Moscow. So I support one of the crews that is gonna go launch next week. The tenth space station crew goes up in October. They go on the 11th of October right now, and I'm gonna go over and support them and get them off the planet.

Tavis: Well, I don't know a whole lot about NASA. I know a little bit. Not as much as you do. But I've pretty much figured this out: living on a space station for 6 months, like so many astronauts do, you ain't gonna meet no woman in outer space if you're living on a space station for 6 months, so you can write that off for 6 months. But beyond that, have you processed what it's going to be like at some point here in the not-too-distant future, I suspect, for you potentially to live on a space station-- you know, those miles away from here--for, like, 6 months? What kind of experience do you think that's gonna be like?

Alvin: Well, I try--like you say, I try and get my mind wrapped around that, but I haven't experienced it. I just know that the interior volume of the space station is about that of a 747. So if you can imagine being in a 747 for 6 months... You can't step outside, you're not gonna run down to the corner store, so everything in that 747 is with you for the next 6 months. Except we bring up resupply ships.

Everybody you know and you get to talk to, aside from whatever fellow astronauts and cosmonauts are up there with you, they're gonna talk to you by way of a radio link. There's no live TV, so you're not gonna turn on ESPN and watch a game, but you can get on the Internet, and you can get e-mail. You can do those things. Everybody I know who's come back from these missions has turned around and signed right back to go back up. They've all loved it. I guess the main thing is the view out the window, and the fact that you're weightless for that amount of time. And you're doing some important things for science and research, and that's rewarding in and of itself.

Tavis: That's why I so respect you: because I hate being on a 747 for 6 hours flying from New York to L.A. A 767 is a problem for me, much less being on a space station for 6 months. Let me close with this--

Alvin: Well, you're not--

Tavis: I'm sorry, go ahead. What were you going to say, Alvin?

Alvin: Well, it's not like you're strapped into a seat with two people sitting on either side of you. You do get to walk around and move around. And nobody's feeding you any cheddar goldfish.

Tavis: Yeah, well, I guess you've got a point there. I guess you've got a point there. I'm not sure the food in outer space is any better, but that's another conversation for another time. Let me offer this as an exit question. With all of the challenges we've discussed here tonight that come along with space travel, clearly you have a love for it. Clearly you're still going forward with your eyes wide open and a smile on your face about what the possibilities are. Tell me what you think your contribution is, being a part of this program, and an African American, no less, as a part of this program.

Alvin: Well, first off, what I hope to accomplish is that especially African American kids can look at me and say, 'You know, if he can do that, I can get there, too. I can study. I can crack the books. If he can go fulfill whatever dream he's got of being an astronaut, I can go do whatever I want,' be it a musician, a football player, or a neurosurgeon--that they'll realize that just by wanting to go out and do that, they can do the right things now to go get that done. As for the space program, I just hope what I do makes the program safer, that it helps us push ourselves out beyond where we are right now in low earth orbit, that we get to places like the moon and mars in the coming decades.

Tavis: His name is Alvin Drew. He is an astronaut in the NASA program. One of just about seven or eight, I think, African American astronauts. For any of the sisters watching, his phone number is 1... Aw, just teasing. Just teasing. Alvin, nice to have you on the program. Have fun in Russia, and we hope to talk to you again when you-- when you come back to earth.

Alvin: All right. Great. Good talking to you.

Tavis: Nice to have you on. Up next on this program, comedian Wanda Sykes. Stay with us.