Mario Runco, Jr.
- STS -44 (1991)
- STS -54 (1993)
- STS -77 (1996)
Mario " Trooper" Runco Jr. ( born January 26, 1952 in Bronx, New York State, United States) is a former American astronaut.
Runco received in 1974 a Bachelor in Earth and Planetary Sciences from the City College of New York in 1976 and a Masters degree in atmospheric physics from Rutgers University. In 1999 he received an honorary doctorate from the City College of New York.
From 1976 he was a year working as Forschungshydrologe for the United States Geological Survey on Long Iceland, New York. In 1977 he went to the police of New Jersey before joining the United States Navy in June 1978. In September 1978, he came to the Oceanographic and Atmospheric Research Laboratory of the Navy to Monterey, California. From April 1981 to December 1983 he was stationed as a meteorologist on the USS Nassau. From January 1984 to December 1985 he was an instructor at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey. Subsequently, he served as commanding officer on ships in the Java Sea and the Indian Ocean, where hydrographic and oceanographic observations were carried out.
Astronauts activity
In June 1987, Runco has been selected by NASA as an astronaut candidate. He was involved in the development of an emergency exit for the Space Shuttle, in the Software Avionics Integration Laboratory ( SAIL) on tests of software, at Kennedy Space Center as a member of the support teams and as a speaker connection ( CAPCOM ). He currently works as Earth and Planetary Scientist ( Earth and Planetary scientists ) in the program for the International Space Station and manned lunar station.
STS -44
On November 24, 1991 Runco started as a mission specialist aboard the space shuttle Atlantis on mission STS - 44th It was a mission for the U.S. Department of Defense. The non-secret payload contained, besides other military experiments, a DSP satellite and its upper-stage engine to carry the satellite into a higher orbit.
STS -54
With the Space Shuttle Endeavour Runco started as a mission specialist 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 -77
As a mission specialist Runco flew as part of the STS -77 mission on the Space Shuttle Endeavour on May 19, 1996 in space. This was the fifth mission of the commercial Spacehab module. Therein, a dozen experiments in the fields of biology, electrical engineering and agriculture were carried out. Furthermore, the platform SPARTAN was exposed, which in turn was called the Inflatable Antenna Experiment ( IAE). This 14 million dollar IAE was an aluminum- coated plastic shell that by nitrogen gas in its actual form - was brought - a dish antenna. The ten-day company was the first flight, the (Consolidated Control Center CCC) was led from the start until the landing of the new control center in Houston.
Private
Mario Runco is married and has two children.