Harrison Schmitt
Harrison Hagan "Jack" Schmitt ( born July 3, 1935 in Santa Rita, Grant County, New Mexico ) is a former American astronaut, geologist and politician. He is the twelfth and so far last man to walk on the moon.
Start of career
After Harrison Schmitt had graduated from high school, he studied at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena (Bachelor) and at the University of Oslo in Norway ( master). In 1964 he received his doctorate in geology from Harvard University awarded.
NASA
Schmitt was the first science NASA astronaut who actually was used. His previous job was to train the other astronauts for the upcoming lunar excursions for geological investigations.
On March 15, 1970, he was assigned as a pilot of the lunar module of the backup crew of Apollo 15. After the usual rule, it would have been so nominated for the main crew of Apollo 18; However, this flight was canceled in September 1970. Under pressure from many sides, he was assigned to the crew of Apollo 17 as a science astronaut on August 13, 1971.
Schmitt's sole use in space lasted from 6 to 19 December 1972. During the Apollo 17 mission, he landed on 11 December with the lunar module Challenger in the Taurus - Littrow region and led together with Eugene Cernan, the longest moon exploration of all Apollo missions by.
Jack Schmitt is the twelfth and being last man to walk on the moon. He left him on 14 December 1972.
Schmitt resigned in August 1975 from from NASA to the Republicans in 1976 to apply for a seat in the United States Senate for New Mexico. He won against incumbent Joseph Montoya and graduated from 3 January 1977 to January 3, 1983, a term as senator, in which he was a member of the Science, Technology, and Space Subcommittee. The re-election he lost in 1982 to Democrat Jeff Bingaman.
Special features and Records
- Largest on the moon rocks collected amount (Apollo 17)
- Longest on the moon in the lunar car distance traveled (Apollo 17)
- First manned night launch of NASA (Apollo 17)
- Last man to walk on the moon; penultimate person who has left the Moon (Apollo 17)
Attitudes towards climate change
Schmitt takes a skeptical position regarding anthropogenic global warming. In his view, global warming is used as a political tool to increase the level of control of the American government; the human impact on climate change has not been established. Since the Planetary Society - according to the scientific consensus on climate change - had the people named as the cause of global warming, he gave in 2008 his resignation from that company known. He also participated among others in a climate skeptic conference of the Heartland Institute, and was a signatory to an open letter by climate skeptics in the Wall Street Journal.