The View from this Horizon

To Stanford rower Mary Cooper, a disability is not a disadvantage

12/28/2021

FOR A FEW weeks this fall, the Stanford boathouse in Redwood City – home of the Cardinal rowing and sailing teams – had no Mary Kate Cooper.

Her lightweight rowing teammates prepared for a new season under a new coach, gathering at dawn to hoist the shells upon their shoulders, place them into the water, push off the dock, and float into the channel. The sun’s rays peaked over the eastern mountains and reflected gold in the San Francisco Bay as the nearby 101 freeway began to hum.

There were sleep-deprived vacant expressions, and occasional laughing and joking, but no Mary.

“She’s off doing something incredible,” teammate Kendall Titus said.

And then, one morning, she was back. A certain spirit and warmth returned to the boathouse, a feeling the team may not have realized was missing, but was obvious in Cooper’s presence.

Her smile drew them in. A senior with a self-designed major of aerospace engineering and computer science, Cooper was training for and flying on a parabolic flight to investigate accessibility in space – part of the first all-disabled crew to experience zero gravity.

As she described the feelings of weightlessness, Cooper sat and removed her left leg. Among her 11 specialized prosthetic legs, she chose a titanium one with a hinge on the foot suited for rowing, and prepared for her return to the water.

Cooper is a below-the-knee amputee, born with a condition called fibular hemimelia. Whether Cooper has a natural left leg or not hardly matters in the boat or in everyday life. It’s a non-subject in the boathouse because it just doesn’t matter to anyone. But it does matter in the path her life has taken.

On Oct. 17, Cooper was among 12 disabled scientists, veterans, students, and artists to board a Boeing 727 in Long Beach as part of Mission: AstroAccess, a joint program among private space enterprises.

Inside the “Vomit Comet,” the Zero Gravity Corporation’s G-Force One, Cooper shivered in the hollowed-out padded cabin as the aircraft made a 90-minute flight over the Pacific to FAA-approved airspace. Interior temperatures were low to reduce the feeling of nausea.

“The moment it sunk in is when they closed the cargo door on the plane,” Cooper said on a BBC podcast. “OK, this is it. I think you could feel the adrenaline. It wasn’t the adrenaline you feel before a drop on a rollercoaster – a scary adrenaline – it was more an excited adrenaline.”

The parabolic maneuver began with the airplane level before the craft turned its nose upward, climbing at a steep rate as Cooper felt a crush of pressure. As the plane crested on an ellipse arc, Cooper felt herself becoming lighter and then completely weightless as the plane reached its peak.

For 22 seconds, Cooper felt like she was in space, before the plane began to point downward and prepare itself for another upward arc -- 31 parabolas in all. In each weightless moment, Cooper had a specific task related to adaptability, with experiments printed on a band on her arm, like a quarterback looking to call a play.

“We had a couple of wheelchair users” Cooper said. “Seeing them stand up, take a step and maneuver … some of them had never done that and some hadn’t done it in years. That was really emotional to see. That alone made the entire flight for me.”

One of her main tasks was “station keeping,” knowing her whereabouts in a disorienting environment while maneuvering from point to point in a timely manner. She practiced putting on and taking off her prosthetic leg while weightless. And, for good measure, she performed a few cartwheels, gobbled up floating globules of water, and tried ‘hamster balling’ – running around the circumference of the circular cabin like a hamster in a ball.

“It’s so hard to know what zero gravity is until you experience it,” Cooper said.

The natural movement response in zero gravity is swimming, moving your arms as if doing the breaststroke. “Rule No. 1, don’t swim,” she said. “It does absolutely nothing.”

Another sensation: Incredible strength.  

“It’s insane,” she said. “Coming back into the parabola, I used my pinkie to go from parallel to the ground to perpendicular. To go to a standing position, you need no power. I pushed off so hard so many times, I’d go straight to the ceiling.”

The sensation of weightlessness was not floating up, but rather not getting pulled down. It’s called a ‘release,’ a perfect word to describe the sensation of being unbound and free.  

Total time in zero gravity was about 15 minutes.

“Someone on our team described it really well,” Cooper said. “As a child you used to pick dandelions and blow them, and all the white flakes would go off and you’d make a wish. It felt like that … like one of those flakes in the wind.”

AFTER EACH PARABOLA, the order was given: “Feet down!” as gravity took hold. After the final command, and upon the landing of the historic flight, Cooper and her team felt a greater sense of purpose.

“This is really just the beginning,” she said of that moment. “We had thousands of ideas and were bouncing off the walls of when we get to go again: What do we want to change? How do we want to do it? It was so exciting.”

Perhaps she’ll get that chance.

“I would love to be an astronaut,” she said. “That’s my dream in life. It’s obviously a lofty goal, but it’s this amazing goal. Someday, going to space won’t be the craziest idea in the world. My kids will probably go on a field trip on a zero-gravity flight, and they’ll ask, ‘What parent chaperone wants to come to space next weekend?’”

The journey to space, or at least zero gravity, began uneasily. Despite sonograms showing no anomalies, Mary was born without a fibula and with a shortened and bowed tibia.

“It was an absolute shock,” said her father, Tom Cooper. “There was something significantly wrong right away. You could see it.”

Tom and Lynn Cooper were told different things by different experts: Mary’s life was in danger; she may never walk. Through their own research and using Tom’s military connections as a Coast Guard helicopter pilot, the family finally got answers.

But that didn’t end the anxiety or confusion. Should they amputate or try to salvage the leg by placing metal rod in place of a bone, and expect a lifetime of surgeries?

“Emotionally, as parents, to make an amputation is a life decision that your kid’s going to have to live with for the rest of her life,” Tom said. “It wasn’t an easy decision to make, but it was the right decision.”

Mary was 11 months old when her left leg was amputated. She has no memories of life before that.

“Being an amputee is part of who I am,” Mary said. “I forget about it all the time. People come up to me and ask, ‘What happened?’ I’m like, ‘Is there food in my teeth? Something in my hair?’”  

As a toddler, Mary was used to scooting around on her own. She received her first prosthetic at age three – basically, a block of wood with a foot and some foam, all covered by a plastic shell. Shortly thereafter, she was plopped on a soccer field. Go score goals.

“That’s how I learned how to use my prosthetic,” she said.

That didn’t mean she accepted it. Mary had a habit of removing her leg and ditching it, causing her parents much anxiety.   

At a grocery store register, Mary dropped her leg on the conveyor belt. At Walmart, she hid the leg on a shelf. Another shopper picked it up. Fortunately, Lynn noticed.

“I think you have my daughter’s leg in your cart,” she said.

In youth soccer, because jerseys are long, socks are high and shin guards bulge at the ankles, it was hard to tell Mary was an amputee. Her teammates knew. But opponents, parents, and the referee? Not so much.

Imagine their shock when Mary’s leg flew off during play.

“I used to feel for them,” Tom said. “We would laugh because we were used to it. But you’ve got to imagine, if you’ve never seen this before, when some kid’s leg goes flying off, you’d be mortified. Absolutely mortified. Mary would just hop to her leg and keep going.”

Forget caution, Mary learned how to ride a bike by duct-taping her foot to the pedal because her prosthetic kept slipping off. She crashed a lot, but she learned.

At the ocean, when others said, “You shouldn’t take the leg in the water,” Mary turned to her dad instead. “We’ll figure it out,” he’d say, and they’d go right in.

“We’d come back from the beach and my leg would weigh 20 more pounds because it was full of sand,” Mary said. “So, we’d go to a gas station and blow the air on it to get the sand out and take it apart in the garage.”

Mary’s interest in engineering grew out of these situations. She often tinkered with her prosthetics, increasingly well-designed over the years and obtained through the Wounded Warrior Project. Mary examined how they worked, pieces scattered around her room. She learned to carry WD-40 and an Allen wrench. If she wanted to wear high heels to the prom, she manipulated a prosthetic. Heels on.

THE COOPERS MOVED frequently and each first day at a new school was fraught with worry. On the first day of kindergarten, Mary insisted on wearing pants to hide her leg. This was in New Orleans, with its heat and humidity. It didn’t take long for Mary to give up that idea and wear the dress uniform instead.

“Of all the things that come about with the moves, that was my biggest fear,” Tom said. “Here’s a new kid. She doesn’t know anybody. She’s different. Will she be accepted?”

With the exception of kindergarten, Mary made sure to start every school year by purposefully leaving the prosthetic leg exposed for all to see.  

“Of course, kids will say mean things,” Mary said. “Robot girl, or whatever it might be. But from a young age, I really saw my disability as a way to teach people what it meant in my mind to be disabled. I prefer when I meet people to not hide my leg. I want to own it, like a challenge to myself: ‘This is who I am.’”

Mary gets inspiration from her father, never willing to enable, but always seeking to build her own understanding of what she was capable of. 

“I will never be as cool as my dad,” she said. “He’s the coolest person I know. He is my hero.”

It’s easy to see why. Stationed in New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina struck on Aug. 23, 2005, Mary and Lynn evacuated (sister Caroline wasn’t born yet), but Tom, a Coast Guard lieutenant, remained.

The city was flooded and dark. Thousands were stranded. For seven consecutive days, with barely an hour of sleep each night, Cooper and his unit rescued more than 7,100 people under challenging conditions.

Piloting a power-limited HU-65B helicopter to the edge of its capacity, Cooper faced hazards such as power lines and downed trees while in danger of midair collisions in an uncontrolled airspace. Cooper’s was the first aircraft on the scene after the storm’s passage.

“The civil government’s broken down, it’s a darkened city, and you’re trying to do this big rescue operation almost in a vacuum, where it’s just you,” he said. “And these families are on rooftops with literally one bag that’s got all their life’s belongings. And you’re just trying to get to them.”

Cooper helped lay the procedural foundation for the entire air rescue operation, establishing landing zones and deciding which helicopters should hoist people and which should transport them out of the city.

In making choices such as who to pick up and who to leave behind, Cooper faced life-threatening situations. With limited power in his craft and urgency as floodwaters rose, he landed on a “semi-rigid” rooftop and rescued 12 trapped people. On another sortie, he held a precise hover within five feet of power lines at night to thread a hoist cable through a web of obstructions to save an elderly couple off a small third-story porch.

He continued saving lives after being warned by authorities about a toxic cloud of hydrogen sulfide in the area and refused to abandon his mission. For his skill and valor, Cooper was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, which was presented by President George W. Bush.

“There were four of us from Air Station New Orleans that got that honor,” said Cooper, now based at Air Station San Francisco at SFO. “I’m really proud of that, proud of the team – a co-pilot, flight mechanic, and rescue swimmer. You’re thrown in the middle of it and you just want to do as much as you can. That’s why we were there. That’s why we joined the service.”

MARY DOESN’T REMEMBER much about the ceremony, other than, “I was hungry.” She was seven at the time. But one thing that stuck was something her dad taught her.

“You rally behind your troops in military terminology,” she said. “But in civilian or Stanford terminology, you rally behind your teammates. You back each other up. Those are the people you’re willing to do anything for.”

It’s another reason that sports are so vital to Mary Cooper. They’ve broken the ice at new schools, helped her make friends, and inspired unlimited goals.

In middle school, where 90 soccer players competed for 25 spots, Mary made the team. She was an outstanding swimmer, approached by U.S. Para Swimming to join the national team. She also competed in Para Track and Field and was on the surf team at Palos Verdes (Calif.), the last of three high schools she attended.

When Mary arrived at Stanford, still clutching that athletic identity, she realized, “I need a team.”

She considered swimming, her best sport. There was precedence at Stanford. Brickelle Bro, another amputee with fibular hemimelia, trained and occasionally raced on the women’s swim team for a season in preparation for the 2016 Paralympics.

Cooper considered club and varsity sports until she was encouraged to try rowing during a random conversation during Stanford’s pre-orientation camping trip, and upon her return to campus, reached out to then-coach Kate Bertko.

Mary had never rowed or been in a rowing shell. Plus, there was the matter of the leg, which could be seen as a weakness in drawing power for the stroke.  

“I think they were a little shocked when I walked into the office,” Cooper said. “I don’t think I was exactly what they pictured.”

From the outset, Bertko treated Cooper with respect, and new coach Madison Keaty has embraced her as well. Mary is forever grateful.

“It was never a matter of, ‘it can’t be done,” Cooper said. “It was, ‘How are we going to do it?’ That was really cool. All the credit to them.”

In her first week on the water, Cooper’s 8-person boat capsized. That almost never happens in rowing. The next day, Bertko greeted them with life preservers, and all had a good laugh.

“I had no idea what I was getting myself into,” Cooper said. “Rowing is so much harder than I thought it was going to be.”

Still, “Even at 5:30 in the morning, she’s the first face you see,” Titus said. “It’s, ‘Kendall, good morning!’ It’s such a joy to be with her, especially when it’s a hard workout, a long morning, and you’re super tired. She always is unwaveringly positive.”

SITTING IN THE plaza at the Graduate School of Business, Cooper paused for a moment from a conversation as a man in a wheelchair rolled by.

“Hey Jeff!” she yelled. “Hello … This dude is a Paralympian.”

Jeff Butler, a student at the Stanford GSB, greeted her happily. He indeed competed in Tokyo in 2021, in wheelchair rugby.

“There’s not many of us,” Mary said of Stanford’s adaptive athletes. “But we do exist.”

Bothered by the inability of para-athletes – such as Butler and Stanford undergraduate Andrew Mangan, a rower – to have the same access to training, coaching, and facilities as able-bodied athletes, Cooper is working to create a Para Pac-12 inclusion policy as part of a conference-sponsored committee to address those concerns.

Cooper discovered that 50.4 percent of the 242 athletes on the U.S. Paralympic team in Tokyo were current, former, or incoming student-athletes representing 76 schools. Of those, 105 competed in varsity intercollegiate sports, though few at the Division I level. Nine Paralympians came from Pac-12 schools, but none competed in a varsity sport. Cooper is the lone varsity para-athlete at a Pac-12 school.

At least two other amputees with fibular hemimelia have competed in major-college sports in recent years – Arkansas track and field 400-meter All-American Hunter Woodhall, and Katie Holloway Bridge, who at Cal State Northridge was the first woman amputee in Division I basketball and currently works for Stanford Athletics.

Other notable amputees in college athletics include San Jose State’s Neil Parry, who returned to action in 2003 on the punt-return unit three years after losing his right leg from an injury suffered in a game on the same field. And Brian Hall, a kicker for Texas Tech, lost his right foot in a childhood farm accident and booted the ball with his prosthetic limb, setting a school record for season field goals in 1976.

Cooper sees herself as a role model and is willing to provide support and encouragement. Mary was a co-leader at Bethany Hamilton’s surf camp for girls with limb loss last fall and has spoken to veterans and their families through the Wounded Warrior Project. 

Cooper’s message to the girls at Hamilton’s camp was: Feel beautiful and confident in whatever your body is.

“I’ve been an amputee for 21 years and I’ve had my ups and downs, but I’m able to see my disability as a positive part of who I am,” she said. “For these girls, this is such a new part of who they are and they can’t even wrap their mind around ever feeling normal again.

“It’s reassuring to know that normal is even possible. And sports are possible. I don’t want disabled people to think less of themselves and not set the bar high. I’m really passionate about dreaming big.”

Cooper has done so. Her major of aerospace engineering and computer science is a combination of the aeronautical and astronautical, computer science, management science and engineering departments. It also includes elements of entrepreneurship, national security, coding, and focuses on human spaceflight.

NASA never has chosen an astronaut with a disability before. Rather than wait for that to change, private space companies are willing to change that. 

Cooper wants to be part of the solution. Even though she doesn’t know what that is, she sees the challenge of problem solving as an “artistic mindset.” This is where her experiences and interests are leading her, to break open the boxes that we’ve stuck ourselves in and think of new ways to solve problems. 

“We have no idea what’s up there,” she said. “So, how are we going to do something that’s never been done before?”

It’s time to flip space travel on its head. It seems clear that disabled astronauts have inherent strengths and advantages that could enhance spaceflight success -- a blind person could be an asset in sensory deprivation, for example. Perhaps American sign language could cut across nationalities and languages. And, why would an amputee be at a disadvantage in space, where the ability to run doesn’t matter.  

It’s enough to keep Cooper thinking beyond the rowing season and into the rest of her life. But will that life be able to top Oct. 17, when she was floating through the clouds?

“Every single night, I lay in bed and try and remember that feeling of complete weightlessness,” Cooper said. “I close my eyes and can almost feel it.

“It’s almost like if you go on a boat or a ship and get used to the rocking, and then you get on land and you still feel the rocking. You can still kind of remember it, like a daze in your memory.

“It’s a feeling I know I’ll be chasing for a long time.”