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Author Topic:   Payload specialists on the space shuttle
MCroft04
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Posts: 1634
From: Smithfield, Me, USA
Registered: Mar 2005

posted 08-14-2014 02:31 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MCroft04   Click Here to Email MCroft04     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I count 56 payload specialists who flew on shuttle missions. I don't think I missed anyone, but has anyone else made a count? If so does it agree with my number?

alanh_7
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From: Ajax, Ontario, Canada
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posted 08-14-2014 02:55 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for alanh_7   Click Here to Email alanh_7     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Are you counting just U.S. or international as well, Mel?

MCroft04
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posted 08-14-2014 03:28 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MCroft04   Click Here to Email MCroft04     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
All of them as long as they were formally designated as a payload specialist.

brianjbradley
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From: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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posted 08-14-2014 05:00 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for brianjbradley   Click Here to Email brianjbradley     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I count 48. This includes international, political, commercial and civilian flyers.

Is it possible you counted PS's who flew more than once (Merbold, Lichtenberg, Walker, Durrance/Parise, Crouch/Linteris)? Or maybe you counted Military Space Engineers as PSs?

Jim Behling
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From: Cape Canaveral, FL
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posted 08-14-2014 05:22 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Jim Behling   Click Here to Email Jim Behling     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by brianjbradley:
Or maybe you counted Military Space Engineers as PSs?
MSEs would be PSs. Doesn't matter what the DOD called them, they were PSs from NASA's point of view.

fredtrav
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posted 08-14-2014 05:32 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for fredtrav   Click Here to Email fredtrav     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I counted 54 but might have missed one or two.

alanh_7
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posted 08-14-2014 07:23 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for alanh_7   Click Here to Email alanh_7     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Payload Specialists. I counted 50.

Hart Sastrowardoyo
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posted 08-14-2014 07:42 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Hart Sastrowardoyo   Click Here to Email Hart Sastrowardoyo     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I can do a recollection after work, but in a story I did for Challenger's 25th anniversary, I noted, "Including Challenger, 22 payload specialists flew on 12 flights in the first five years of shuttle operations. Just 29 other civilians — mostly scientists this time — flew between 1988, when shuttle flights resumed, and 2003."

So 22+29=51.

Hart Sastrowardoyo
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posted 08-14-2014 07:52 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Hart Sastrowardoyo   Click Here to Email Hart Sastrowardoyo     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I have time, so using Wikipedia:

Merbold; Lichtenberg; Walker; Garneau; Scully-Power; Payton; Garn; van den Berg; Wang; Baudry; al-Saud; Acton; Bartoe; Pailes; Furrer; Messerschmid; Ockels; Neri Vela; Cenker; Nelson; Jarvis; and McAuliffe= 22

Post-Challenger:
Durrance; Parise; Gaffney; Hughes-Fulford; Hennen; Bondar; Frimout; DeLucas; Trinh; Malerba; Mohri; MacLean; Walter; Schlegal; Fettman; Mukai; Leslie; Sacco; Guidoni; Favier; Thirsk; Crouch; Linteris; Tryggvason; Kadenyuk; Buckley; Pawelczyk; Glenn; and Ramon = 29 = 51 total.

These are people who flew designated as Payload Specialists, even though some would later undergo NASA training and qualify (and in most cases, fly) as Mission Specialists.

I asked this in another thread, but anyone know (aside from ego) why the Russians flew as Mission Specialists and not Payload Specialists?

MCroft04
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From: Smithfield, Me, USA
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posted 08-14-2014 08:10 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MCroft04   Click Here to Email MCroft04     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Thanks to all. Lots of different numbers but now I have some lists to compare to mine.

MCroft04
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Posts: 1634
From: Smithfield, Me, USA
Registered: Mar 2005

posted 08-14-2014 08:39 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MCroft04   Click Here to Email MCroft04     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I found some duplicates in my list. If I add Chiaki Mukai to the list of 51 PSs from Wikipedia, that makes 52 which I believe is correct.

Robert Pearlman
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posted 08-14-2014 08:45 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Robert Pearlman   Click Here to Email Robert Pearlman     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Who is the 52nd not included in Hart's list? Mukai is included.

(I pulled together a quick list and got 51.)

MCroft04
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From: Smithfield, Me, USA
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posted 08-14-2014 09:00 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MCroft04   Click Here to Email MCroft04     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
As always you (and Hart) are correct. I think we have a winner; 51!

Jim Behling
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From: Cape Canaveral, FL
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posted 08-15-2014 07:15 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Jim Behling   Click Here to Email Jim Behling     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Hart Sastrowardoyo:
I asked this in another thread, but anyone know (aside from ego) why the Russians flew as Mission Specialists and not Payload Specialists?
They were already "astronauts" and they went thru MS training vs PS.

Hart Sastrowardoyo
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From: Toms River, NJ
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posted 08-15-2014 12:37 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Hart Sastrowardoyo   Click Here to Email Hart Sastrowardoyo     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I guess I understand that. But I guess what I'm also confused about is that Canada and Japan and ESA had their own astronaut corps - Baudry, for example was backup to Chretien and so was trained as a cosmonaut yet still flew as a PS and not as an MS.

alanh_7
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From: Ajax, Ontario, Canada
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posted 08-15-2014 02:16 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for alanh_7   Click Here to Email alanh_7     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
To be honest, I wondered that too. Both Marc Garneau and Robert Thirsk flew as payload specialists. Garneau flew again as a mission specialist on STS-77 and STS-97 and Thirsk returned to space as a mission specialist on Soyuz TMA-15 (Expedition 20/21). Both had been training for years with the CSA and NASA and not as single payload specialists.

Hart Sastrowardoyo
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From: Toms River, NJ
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posted 08-15-2014 05:45 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Hart Sastrowardoyo   Click Here to Email Hart Sastrowardoyo     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
In the case of Garneau and Thirsk (and Tryggvason, who never flew again), they (and others on that list) later took NASA training to become mission specialists. Baudry, though, already had prior training; for that matter, so did Glenn.

Skylon
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posted 08-16-2014 08:47 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Skylon     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Was there any reason Wubbo Ockles, who was trained as a mission specialist with the 1980 astronaut class, was designated as a payload specialist on STS-61A?

I also recall, something about training Nicollier and Ockles as mission specialists that didn't go over well at parts of Johnson Space Center. Can anyone confirm?

Also, to take a side-step to the Russians, I'd guess a combination of factors led to them being designated mission specialists.

First, Russians would gradually take on key roles towards mission success (EVAs during STS-86 and STS-106), the same as mission specialists.

Americans flying Soyuz and on Mir were expected to have equal familiarity in its systems to the Russians — I see no reason the Russians who flew on shuttle would not receive the same depth of training.

Cosmonauts had been through, an albeit different, but nonetheless proven astronaut training program — the ESA, CSA and NASDA/JAXA astronauts had to always get their training at either Star City or JSC. Cosmonauts came to JSC with that experience already. I call this professional courtesy almost (how could you say veteran cosmonauts were "payload specialists" and implicitly, unequal to American mission specialists).

Docked spacecraft are considered one vehicle. This may have resulted in the Russians, even if they were just on the Mir or ISS side, receiving some mandatory shuttle training.

Finally, and this may apply across the board to why ESA, Japanese and CSA astronauts eventually were all undergoing mission specialist training for ISS all those involved became full partners. It technically was not supposed to matter the country or agency or origin, each astronaut flying an ISS assembly mission, a Soyuz taxi of an full expedition had to be qualified in each necessary link of the ISS chain.

Hart Sastrowardoyo
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Posts: 3445
From: Toms River, NJ
Registered: Aug 2000

posted 08-16-2014 10:10 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Hart Sastrowardoyo   Click Here to Email Hart Sastrowardoyo     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Interestingly, MSEs - who had their own training system - did undergo EVA training, although PSs would never be allowed to do such tasks. I suppose "national security" would trump such a stance.

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