Bruce E. Melnick
- STS -41 (1990)
- STS -49 (1992 )
Bruce Edward Melnick ( born December 5, 1949 in New York City, New York ) is a former American astronaut and officer of the U.S. Coast Guard.
Training
After his high school graduation in 1967 Melnick studied engineering. First, he attended the Technical University of Georgia, before joining the Coast Guard Academy in Connecticut. This gave him in 1972 a BA in engineering. Then he came to the University of West Florida, the professional aeronautical engineering and received a master's degree in 1975.
Melnick was for 20 years a member of the U.S. Coast Guard. Among other things, he was operations officer and test pilot.
NASA activities
Melnick was elected to the twelfth astronaut group (The Gaffer ) NASA in June 1987. After training as a mission specialist, he worked in various support teams at the Kennedy Space Center.
His first space missions completed Melnick as a member of the crew of STS -41. The flight was carried out by the Space Shuttle Discovery in October 1990 and continued the Ulysses solar probe from.
Melnick's second and final space mission took place two years later and was the maiden flight of the orbiter Endeavour. STS -49 flew to the started in March 1990 INTELSAT satellites F- 3, which had been deposed in a wrong orbit. The satellite was equipped with a new high school, which led him into a geostationary orbit.
In all, he spent 12 days, 23 hours and 27 minutes ( approx 300 hours) in space. Melnick was the first astronaut of the U.S. Coast Guard.
According to the NASA
1992 Melnick from different both from the Coast Guard as well as by NASA and went to Lockheed Space Operations Company. In 1994 he moved to the United Space Alliance, 1996 McDonnell Douglas, which merged in 1997 with Boeing. Melnick was at Kennedy Space Center is responsible for all services rendered there Boeing for NASA and the U.S. Department of Defense. This included not only the payload of the Space Shuttle, but also of Delta rockets. Melnick was eliminated on 1 April 2007 by Boeing.
Others
On April 28, 2001 Melnick received an honorary doctorate from the University of West Florida for his contributions to the natural sciences. He lives with his wife and two children on Merritt Iceland (Florida ).