Joseph P. Allen
- STS -5 ( 1982)
- STS -51 -A ( 1984)
Joseph Percival "Joe" Allen IV (* June 27, 1937 in Crawfordsville, Indiana ) is a former American astronaut who participated in two space flights.
Life
Joe Allen grew up in Crawfordsville on in the U.S. state of Indiana and attended the local primary school and the Crawfordsville High School. In 1959, he received a Bachelor in Mathematics and Physics of DePauw University in Greencastle (Indiana). He moved to Yale University in 1961 and received a master's degree and four years later the Doctor in Physics.
1965 and 1966 Allen worked as a physicist at the Laboratory of Nuclear structures of Yale University. From 1963 to 1967 he was also a guest of scientific staff at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Prior to his selection as an astronaut, he worked for Nuclear Physics of the University of Washington as a research assistant in the laboratory.
Astronauts activity
Allen was taken on August 4, 1967 in the sixth group of NASA astronauts, the second group, which consisted not of pilots but from scientists. The necessary training for pilots graduated from Allen at the Vance Air Force Base in Oklahoma. When Apollo 15 mission, he was scientist and member of the support team. Both Apollo 15 and Apollo 17 was Allen speaker connection ( Capcom ). There he worked as a scientific and technical advisor in the Council of the U.S. President for International Economic Policy.
From August 1975 to 1978 Allen was at NASA Headquarters in Washington DC stationed there and was entrusted with administrative tasks. In 1978 he returned to the Johnson Space Center. There he was involved in the planning of the first test flight of a space shuttle into orbit and was the liaison spokesman for the mission. In 1980 and 1981 he worked as a technical assistant to the flight director at NASA.
STS -5
From 11 to 16 November 1982 Allen took on STS -5, his first space flight aboard the space shuttle Columbia part.
STS 41 -H
The mission STS -41 -H should be carried out in September 1984 on behalf of the U.S. Department of Defense or instead expose a TDRS satellites. Due to problems with the IUS upper stage, the mission was canceled. As the occupying Frederick Hauck, David Walker, Joseph Allen, Anna Fisher, Dale Gardner and payload specialists of the U.S. Air Force Gary Payton and Frank Casserino were nominated. As a replacement payload specialist Daryl Joseph was provided. In addition to the payload specialists all astronauts were on mission STS -51 -A.
STS -51 -A
His second space flight, STS -51 -A aboard Discovery, began on 8 November and ended on 16 November 1984. Both spaceflights two satellites were exposed. Also two satellites were recaptured in the second mission, which had been suspended during the mission STS -41 - B on a low orbit. To capture the two satellites led Allen and his colleague Dale Gardner by two spacewalks. Overall, Allen spent 13 days in space.
Even before his second flight into space appeared in 1984, written by Allen nonfiction foray into space - my space flight on the Space Shuttle, in which he describes his experiences during STS -5 and this impressively illustrated with 1000 images.
Exit from the NASA
Allen left NASA on 1 July 1985 and became Managing Director of Space Industries International in Washington, DC. Later he became chairman of Veridian Corporation. He joined in 2004 from this post back.
On April 30, 2005 Allen was inducted into the Astronaut Hall of Fame.
Allen is married and has two children.