Donald R. McMonagle
- STS -39 (1991)
- STS -54 (1993)
- STS -66 ( 1994)
Donald Ray McMonagle ( born May 14, 1952 in Flint, Michigan, United States) is a former American astronaut.
McMonagle received a bachelor's degree in aerospace engineering from the United States Air Force Academy in 1985 and a Masters in Mechanical Engineering from California State University, Fresno in 1974. In 2003 he received a Master of Business Administration from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business.
1975 McMonagle received at the United States Air Force his pilot's license. In 1976 he was stationed a year on the Kunsan Air Base in South Korea. In 1979, he worked as a pilot instructor at Luke Air Force Base in Arizona. In 1981 he graduated at Edwards Air Force Base training as a test pilot and was then used until 1986 as a test pilot.
Astronauts activity
After an unsuccessful bid for the eleventh astronaut group McMonagle was selected in June 1987 by NASA as an astronaut candidate by NASA twelfth group and trained as a pilot. In January 1996 he was appointed to set up a project office for spacewalks. In August 1997, he was Manager of Launch Integration at Kennedy Space Center (KSC ). In this role he was responsible for the launch preparations of the Space Shuttle, the implementation of take-offs and the return of the space shuttles, if they landed at a place other than the KSC. He was head of mission - Manangement team and met as such the final decision on the launch of the Space Shuttle.
STS -39
Although McMonagle had completed his astronaut training as a shuttle pilot, he received his first flight assignment as a mission specialist. On April 28, 1991, aboard the space shuttle Discovery into space. STS -39 was the first non-secret shuttle mission of the U.S. Department of Defense. For this mission, only the MPEC experiment was classified as secret. Furthermore, were studied southern auroras, conducted various experiments and exposed several small satellites.
STS -54
With the Space Shuttle Endeavour McMonagle began as a pilot on 13 January 1993 on mission STS - 54th Main objectives of this mission were exposing the $ 200 million Tracking and Data Relay Satellite ( TDRS -F) and attempts to X-ray astronomy with the Diffuse X -ray Spectrometer ( DXS ).
STS -66
On November 3, 1994 McMonagle started as commander of the shuttle Atlantis ATLAS - 3 mission (Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science ). This Spacelab mission took seven experiments that had already done their work on the previous ATLAS missions, the solar energy output and the chemical balance of the atmosphere under the microscope. In the flight of the German carrier SPAS was suspended for several days, was traveling with his two devices also on behalf of ATLAS. One of these experiments was also from Germany - CRISTA ( Cryogenic Infrared Spectrometers and Telescopes for the Atmosphere ).
According to the NASA
In June 2006, he joined Raytheon to Tucson, Arizona.
Private
Donald McMonagle is married and has two children.