 |
 |
After being selected as one of 35 astronauts from a pool of 8,000+ candidates in 1978, Norman E. Thagard, M.D. broke a 21-year old American record for the longest space flight when he became the first American to live and work aboard the Russian Mir space station. Launching from Central Asia on a Russian Soyuz rocket, he spent four months performing experiments and collecting data on the effects of long-term space flight. In 1995, he held the U.S. record for most days spent in space - 140! As a result of his NASA service, he has earned numerous awards and his Russian space suit was donated to the National Air & Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C. He retired from NASA in January 1996.
Prior to his NASA career, Thagard was active in the United State Marine Corps Reserve. As a captain and naval aviator, he flew 163 missions in Vietnam between 1969 and 1970. In sum, he has logged over 2,200 hours of flying time.
Today, Thagard holds an eminent scholar chair at Florida State University and serves as executive director of the Challenger Learning Center of Tallahassee, a space education complex that includes shuttle/mission control/space station simulators, a planetarium and IMAX theater. In addition, he is an aerospace consultant and has served as technical advisor on two space-oriented major motion pictures - Virus and Armageddon. Thagard holds prestigious positions with many national organizations and institutions, including the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, United States Air Force Institute of Technology, Committee on Human Exploration and the Space Studies Board of the National Research Council.
After earning bachelor's and master's degrees
in engineering science from Florida State University, he earned a medical
degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. He remains
a licensed physician. Born in 1943, Thagard resides in his native state
of Florida with his wife, Kirby. They have three children. In his spare
time, he enjoys classical music and electronic design.