Stargazing Guy

Follow for a weekly list of forthcoming astronaut* birthdays.

Maybe you share a birthday?!

If not, perhaps it will be you who adds your name to the list?!

If you do share a birthday, what does it mean to you?

Do you feel a connection, pride? They take to the skies (on controlled explosions) to improve the world, to explore (to travel to strange new worlds).

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26 September 1948 Vladimír Remek (IK), Czech Republic. Remek carried Czechoslovakia’s flag into space on 2 March 1978 becomming the first non-Soviet and non-American. With the entry of the Czech Republic and Slovakia into the European Union, Remek is considered to be the first astronaut from the European Union, and was carried into space on Soyuz 28.

27 September 1952 Dumitru Prunariu (IK), Romania

27 September 1966 Stephanie Wilson (NASA), US. Wilson is now one of 18 members of the Artemis astronaut team, a group of nine men and nine women. She has been an astronaut longer than anyone else on the team and has flown more times than all but one of them. She is NASA’s most senior, most flown-in-space African American female astronaut. Selected to become an astronaut in 1996, she became the second Black woman in space, flying on three Space Shuttle missions to the International Space Station (ISS) and logging 42 days in orbit. Not part of Artemis II, her odds of earning a spot on a four-person Artemis crew seem good.

Establishing long-term lunar science and exploration capabilities, and inspire the next generation of explorers – The Artemis Generation.

27 September 1976 Luca Parmitano (ESA), Italy. Currently JSC/EAC Liaison Officer, Lead Astronaut, at the Johnson Space Center, the Italian astronaut Parmitano became the first DJ in orbit, as he spins ‘Out of This World’ set in orbit from the International Space Station, on 13 August 2019, to a cruise ship of clubbers in the Mediterranean Sea.

28 September 1940 Aleksandr Ivanchenkov (RKA), Russia

29 September 1942 Clarence W. Nelson (NASA), US. In January 1986, he became the second sitting member of Congress to fly in space when he served as a payload specialist on the Space Shuttle Columbia. On 19 March 2021, the Biden Administration announced that they had nominated Sen. Clarence William Nelson II (aka. Bill Nelson), a Democratic Senator from Florida, an attorney, and a former payload specialist at NASA as NASA Administrator. On Monday, 3 May 2021, he assumed the role of 14th NASA Administrator during a ceremony where he was given the oath of office.

29 September 1959 James Halsell (NASA), US. We are all human and all have human faults – even astronauts. James Halsell Jr, who travelled to space five times, will spend four years in prison and 10 years on supervised release as he pleads guilty to killing two young sisters in car crash.

29 September 1966 Liu Boming (CSNA), China. Updated birthdate – 17 September 1966. With a combined total of three EVA’s performed, Boming has spent some 13 hours walking in space which is currently the record by a Chinese astronaut, as at 24 September 2023.

30 September 1949 Michel Tognini (ESA), France

30 September 1964 Stephen Frick (NASA), US

1 October 1950 Boris Morukov (RKA), Russia

1 October 1964 Eric A. Boe (NASA), US. Boe is currently training for the crew flight test of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft.

Thanks to www.supercluster.com for the bios and links.

Also, thanks to www.pillownaut.com for the list of birthdays.      

* = includes cosmonaut, taikonaut, parastronaut, spaceflight participant, space tourist, etc

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PS: I love coffee. BuyMeACoffee, leave a message with a date and time and we can share it, remotely, at the same time, and think about the Cosmos.

In the meantime, take care of yourself and if you can, someone else, too, because as Adam Smith said, “we naturally desire not only to be loved but to be lovely”.

Remember, hope lives here.

Contact Stargazing Guy for any copyright-related requests or queries @ stargazer1@stargazingguy.co.uk