Eugene Merle Shoemaker

Eugene Merle Shoemaker ( born April 28, 1928 in Los Angeles, USA, † July 18, 1997 in a car accident near Alice Springs, Australia), and Gene Shoemaker, was an American geologist, impact researchers and astronomer. He is best known as co- discoverer and namesake of the comet Shoemaker- Levy 9 ( with his wife Carolyn Shoemaker and David H. Levy ).

In his thesis at Princeton Shoemaker could conclusively show that the Barringer Meteor Crater is actually caused by a meteorite impact. In 1960 he was, along with Edward CT Chao, prove that even the Ries was created by a meteorite impact.

In 1961 he founded the Astro Geological research program of the United States Geological Survey and was its first director. He was also involved in the Lunar Ranger missions and the training of American astronauts for the Apollo program. Shoemaker was even provided the first scientific astronaut for the Apollo program and was supposed to fly to the moon, but for health reasons it did not happen and he trained in consequence the Apollo crews.

His career in astronomy began in 1973, when he began to look at the Palomar Observatory for asteroids and comets that cross the Earth's orbit. Later, he was assisted by his wife Carolyn and David Levy. In addition to the discovery of the comet Shoemaker- Levy 9 Shoemaker 's group was still the discovery of some 30 other comets and asteroids of about 800, including many near-Earth asteroids recorded.

Eugene Shoemaker died on the afternoon of July 18, 1997 in a head- on collision on a dirt road in the Tanamiwüste north-west of Alice Springs. A few grams of his ashes were brought from the Lunar Prospector spacecraft on the moon. As container was a capsule the size of a lipstick, in which a verse from William Shakespeare's " Romeo and Juliet" was engraved.

In honor of his contributions to the Impact Research the originally designated as " Teague " impact crater has been renamed to " Shoemaker crater ". A lunar crater is named after Eugene Shoemaker.