Joseph R. Tanner
- STS -66 ( 1994)
- STS -82 (1997)
- STS -97 (2000)
- STS- 115 (2006)
Joseph Richard " Joe" Tanner ( born January 21, 1950 in Danville, Illinois, USA ) is a former American astronaut.
Tanner is located in Danville, a small town about 200 kilometers south of Chicago, just on the border of the State of Indiana. The parents owned 50 acres of land and Joe spent there together with his four brothers childhood. Joe has British roots, because the maternal grandfather comes from the small Welsh village of Llanddewi Brefi.
After primary school, Tanner attended Danville High School, which he successfully completed in 1968. For the study, he moved to the west of Danville located campus Urbana- Champaign, where he took the Mechanical Engineering at the University of Illinois. As an avid swimmer Tanner was captain of the swimming team of UIUC ( University of Illinois at Urbana -Champaign ). The Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at UIUC in 1973 awarded him a bachelor.
With the completion of his studies, Tanner joined the U.S. Navy and was trained as a Navy pilot. In 1975 he was assigned as pilot of the A-7 " Corsair II" the 94th Attack Squadron, which is stationed at Naval Air Station Lemoore in California. Together with other squadrons formed the "Mighty Strikes" a flight association, which was used on the aircraft carrier "USS Coral Sea ". Finally, he finished as an instructor at the training squadron 4 in Pensacola (Florida ) his active service in the Navy.
In August 1984, Tanner was hired as an aircraft engineer and research pilot from the Johnson Space Center (JSC ) in Houston, Texas. On the nearby Ellington Field, the airfield of the JSC, he was primarily concerned with the training of astronauts. He brought the budding Shuttle pilots with the Shuttle Training Aircraft at the landing of the space shuttle. He also worked as aeronautical safety officer and was head of the pilot department. He had brought it to the Deputy Chief of Aircraft Operations Division at JSC, where he had to manage the entire fleet of aircraft, when he was elected to the astronaut corps.
Astronauts activity
Tanner always points to Shepard's flight on Mercury - Redstone 3 in May 1961 when he was asked how long he wanted to be an astronaut. In order to fly, he committed himself to the Navy. The application as an astronaut was only logical for him, because after all was a flight into orbit the highest form of flying. Like most astronauts Joe took several tries to be selected. As the 12th NASA group was sought in 1987, he had at least made it into the final selection. In March it the JSC had invited for interviews and medical examinations. He was rejected.
Together with 18 other candidates Tanner was the end of March 1992 presented to the public. Half a year later began the one-year basic training for the 14th astronaut group. After its completion, he was a full-fledged mission specialist and worked in the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory ( SAIL), before he was set up in January 1994 for his first space flight.
The shuttle flight STS -66 ran under the name ATLAS -3, because it was the third use of the Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science, the Atlantis completed in November 1994. It 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 ).
End of May 1995 Tanner was nominated along with the other three astronauts for STS -82. Since then, he trained for spacewalks ( EVAs ) with which the Hubble telescope should be repaired. STS -82 led in February 1997 due to necessary maintenance and repair work on the seven years earlier started reflecting telescope. Tanner formed, along with his colleague Harbaugh is one of two EVA team. The two exchanged electronic parts of Hubble at two exits with a total of 14 hours.
Only a few months after his second space flight made Tanner along with a dozen other astronauts, a group that has been prepared in the water tank of the JSC in detail for future work outside the International Space Station ( ISS).
From the autumn of 1998 coached Tanner for his first flight to the ISS. STS -97 in December 2000 brought a lattice structure to the ISS, which is used to power the station. Together with his colleagues Noriega fortified Tanner on three days equipped with the solar cell element to the space station. Overall, the two worked 19 hours in open space.
With an experience of five exits with a total duration of about 33 hours Tanner 2001 transferred the management of the astronaut office EVA Branch.
In February 2002, Tanner was assigned to the crew of the Shuttle flight STS -115, which began on 9 September 2006. Main payload of the Atlantis was the 16 -ton P3/P4 element with which the space station has been extended. During the mission, Tanner undertook together with Heide Stefanyshyn - Piper two spacewalks together of 13 hours. They mounted P3/P4 at the P1 carrier, put all necessary connections and activated a cooling system. The mission went to twelve days to an end.
Tanner left NASA in August 2008. He now works as a lecturer at the University of Colorado at Boulder, as well as self-employed in the field of aviation and space technology.
Joe Tanner and his wife, Martha, have two grown sons.