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[i]Positioned between the two European astronauts aboard Atlantis is the 300th American to enter space, but only by a few inches. The 301st and 302nd astronauts were quick to follow him by less than a second. "I think if you look at the shuttle, [Stan Love is] the first one in space," said STS-122 pilot Alan Poindexter in an interview with collectSPACE. "Stan is on the middeck and I think the middeck seats are actually slightly forward of the pilot seat. I think when you go up to the flight deck, you are actually, maybe a little aft of the forward middeck seats," explained Poindexter, who like Love is making his first flight. Not that Love is enamored with the title. "If you're the first, it's a big deal. If you're the 300th or the 301st, to me it's no difference," said Love. Poindexter agreed. "It's a unique novelty but it doesn't mean much. What it means is that there have been 300 Americans in space and someday, hopefully, it will be 3,000. We would really like to have more people in space. That's what we're after, right?" Mission specialist Leland Melvin, a former NFL football player, is the third on the crew that was eligible for the record. He is seated on the flight deck behind Poindexter. "When I look back on the people that have paved the way, the Gemini, the Apollo, the Mercury programs, the Skylab and all these programs, they have passed on this lineage and this heritage to us. In turn, I hope that I can do the same for the next explorers that will help inspire this next generation of explorers. It's an honor if I were to go down as the 300th [American] in space," Melvin said.[/i]
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