Steven Smith (astronaut)

  • STS -68 (1994)
  • STS -82 (1997)
  • STS- 103 (1999)
  • STS- 110 (2002)

Steven Lee Smith ( born December 30, 1958 in Phoenix, Arizona, United States) is an American astronaut.

Smith received a bachelor's degree in 1981 in Electrical Engineering, a Masters in Electrical Engineering in 1982 and 1987, a master's in business administration. All three degrees are from Stanford University. From 1982 to 1985 Smith worked for IBM in the Large Scale Integration Technology Group in San Jose ( California). Until 1989, he was then Product Manager at Hardware and Systems Management Group at IBM.

Astronauts activity

In 1989, Smith came to NASA, where he worked in the Mission Operations Directorate in the preparation of payloads and supported the teams in the Control Panel. He was selected as astronaut candidate in 1992. In September 1993, Smith was assigned as its first astronaut selection group to a space flight. He worked for the astronaut office at the main engines, the solid rocket boosters, external tank and on the security for the Space Shuttle. In addition, Smith was assigned to the support teams for the shuttle launches and landings at Kennedy Space Center for one and a half years.

He currently works in the NASA program for the flight of the Automated Transfer Vehicle ( ATV) to the International Space Station (ISS).

STS -68

In his first mission, STS -68 he flew aboard the space shuttle Endeavour on September 30, 1994 in the space. It was the second flight of the Space Radar Laboratory. The two main instruments on board were the SIR-C/X-SAR ( Shuttle Imaging Radar-C/X-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar) and MAPS (Measurement of Air Pollution from Satellites ). On October 11, the space shuttle landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

STS -82

With the space shuttle Discovery Smith flew on 11 February 1997 on the second maintenance mission for the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Smith participated in three of the five spacewalks part (EVA), which were necessary for the repair of the telescope. In addition to a tape recorder, which was replaced with a core memory, the HST received the infrared camera and the spectroscope NICMOS STIS. For two spectrographs were expanded.

STS -103

On 20 December 1999 Smith started with the space shuttle Discovery to the next servicing mission for the Hubble Space Telescope. During this mission, new instruments and system extensions have been installed. As Payload Commander Smith this time was involved in two of the three spacewalks.

STS -110

On his last mission so far Smith flew on 8 April 2002 with the space shuttle Atlantis to the International Space Station. Here, the lattice structure element S0 and a rail car to the ISS were brought. The as " Mobile Transporter" designated sled uses a directory on the grid elements laid rail system. Again Smith led by two spacewalks, making a total of seven exits with a duration of almost 50 hours, the Americans with the currently the third-largest EVA experience.

Private

Steven Smith is married and has one child.

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