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Pat Duggins
Pat Duggins
Senior News Analyst
pduggins@wmfe.org


 

January 10, 2008—While NASA struggles to get Space Shuttle Atlantis off the ground, four new inductees were named for the U.S. Astronauts’ Hall of Fame. They represent missions both famous and infamous.

Bryan O’Connor, Loren Shriver, John Blaha, and Bob Cabana. Who?

Folks who cover the space program regularly are familiar with these gentlemen, although most Americans might need to be reminded these are veteran astronauts who are about to be inducted into the U.S. Astronauts Hall of Fame in Titusville. The more familiar space veterans like Neil Armstrong and John Glenn are already there, and in more recent years, names from the Shuttle era are being added. No less deserving perhaps, though more anonymous.

Bob Cabana led the mission to snap together the first two parts of the International Space Station. Bryan O’Connor was commander of the first Spacelab Life Sciences Mission. John Blaha served aboard the Russian Mir Space Station, and Loren Shriver (seen here munching on M & M's aboard Atlantis in 1992), delivered the Hubble Space Telescope on a previous mission. That’s how the press releases might read.

I remember Blaha as the pilot of the first night time launch of the Space Shuttle following the Challenger accident. He was the last minute replacement for astronaut David Griggs who was killed while flying a vintage World War II airplane. Loren Shriver’s first flight was a classified defense department mission, where one of the Shuttle’s solid rocket boosters had the worst case of o-ring burn-through prior to the Challenger accident in 1986.

On another subject, many thanks to everyone for the kind response to my talk on C-SPAN’s BookTV about "Final Countdown" on New Year's Day. It's nice to know I was considered at least as entertaining as the U.S. House Appropriations Committee ;) If you’d like to see the video clip, then click on…

http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/index.php?main_page=product_video_info&products_id=203165-1

Still waiting on progress on Atlantis. NASA’s shooting for the end of January or early February, depending on how the new electrical plug on the tank performs.

More to come--

Photo courtesy of NASA

 

 

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