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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20 November 1968 James Dutton (NASA) US.

21 November 1933 Henry Hartsfield (NASA) US.

22 November 1930 Owen Garriott (NASA) US. Garriott’s second space flight was aboard STS-9 (Spacelab-1) from 28 November 1983, a multidisciplinary and international mission of 10 days aboard Space Shuttle Columbia. Garriott was also an Extra Class amateur radio operator holding call sign W5LFL. He operated the world’s first amateur radio station in space and, on 1 December 1983, made the first amateur radio contact from space using a Motorola handheld 2-meter radio while on board the STS-9 Space Shuttle Columbia mission. Amateur radio subsequently expanded into an important activity on dozens of shuttle flights, Space Station Mir and the International Space Station, with scores of astronauts and cosmonauts participating.

22 November 1942 Guion Bluford (NASA) US. Bluford became the first black American astronaut to travel in space, aboard, Space Shuttle STS-8 Challenger on 30 August 1983. He took part in 4 Shuttle flights from 1983 to 1992. He was the 2nd black person in space: the first being the Cuban cosmonaut, Arnaldo Méndez.

23 November 1935 Vladislav Volkov (RKA) Russia. Volkov was a Soviet cosmonaut who flew as flight engineer on the Soyuz 7 (12 October 1969) and Soyuz 11 (6 June 1971) missions. Soyuz 11 had accomplished the first space station flight, two years before the US Skylab, and docked with the Salyut 1 scientific station. The planned 30-day stay was aborted due to a small fire and difficult working conditions. On 29 June 1971, Volkov died with the rest of the Soyuz 11 crew (Georgy Dobrovolsky and Viktor Patsayev) during re-entry, due to a premature cabin decompression. The crew had no space suits to protect themselves. They are the only humans to have died in space.

USSR stamp: Cosmonauts Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov and Viktor Patsayev. Series: In Memory of Cosmonauts, Who Died During the “Soyuz 11” Space Mission, June 6-30, 1971. Text in red on top “подвиг героев будет жить века” means “Feat of heroes will live for centuries”.

Space is hard and the people who do mighty things risk their lives for science, humanity and the exploration of space.

Ad astra per aspera.

25 November 1940 Reinhard Furrer (NASA) Austria. Before going to space, Furrer studied at the Free University of Berlin, where he received a diploma in 1969, and a doctorate in 1972. During his time as a student in Berlin, he was involved in the building of the 145 metre (475′) long “Tunnel 57” below the Berlin Wall, which was the escape route of 57 people from East Berlin to the West.

26 November 1937 Boris Yegorov (RKA) Russia. Yegorov was a Soviet physician-cosmonaut who became the first physician to make a space flight in Voskhod 1 on 12 October 1964.

26 November 1963 Richard R. Arnold (NASA) US.

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

Also, thanks to www.pillownaut.com for the initial list of birthdays, and the many, many resources on the internet, especially Wikipedia and NASA.      

* = 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