Leroy Chiao

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Leroy Chiao
Leroy Chiao
Country: United States
Organization: NASA
selected on Jan 17, 1990
(13th NASA Group)
Calls: 4 space flights
Start of the
first space flight: 		July 8, 1994
Landing of the
last space flight: 		April 24, 2005
Time in space: 229d 8h 45min
EVA inserts: 6th
EVA total duration: 36h 7min
retired on December 2005
Space flights

Leroy Chiao ( Chinese  焦 立 中 , Pinyin Jiāo Lìzhōng ; born August 28, 1960 in Milwaukee , Wisconsin , USA ) is a former American astronaut .

Chiao was born in Wisconsin to Chinese immigrants and grew up in California in 1967 . His parents, Tsu-Tao and Cherry Chiao, left Taiwan for the United States in the late 1950s to get a better education as chemists.

In 1978 Chiao graduated from Monte Vista High School in the small town of Danville, California . He began studying chemical engineering at the University of California at Berkeley and earned his bachelor's degree in 1983 . Two years later, a master’s degree followed at the Santa Barbara campus - and finally a doctorate in 1987 .

With a PhD in chemistry, Chiao joined Hexcel for two years at one of the leading companies for new materials. In cooperation with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA , he developed mirror for future telescopes made entirely of polymer made. In spring 1989 he moved to the well-known Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory . As a research engineer, he worked there on new composite materials .

Astronaut activity

Of the total of 1945 applicants who had registered for the 13th astronaut group of the US space agency, 23 were selected and presented in January 1990. Chiao was one of 16 mission specialists who completed their one-year basic training in the summer of 1991. He had already registered for the 12th NASA group, but had already been rejected at the beginning of the selection process. Before Chiao was nominated for his first space flight, he was involved in the further development of the software for the shuttle computers.

From October 1992 he was preparing for STS-65 , a flight that was carried out in July 1994 with the US space shuttle Columbia . Around seven dozen experiments from the fields of biology and materials science were on the program during the 15-day Spacelab flight.

A few months after its maiden flight, Chiao was entrusted with its next mission: STS-72 was the first shuttle flight in 1996. The team captured a Japanese satellite launched ten months earlier and put the OAST platform out of action for two days. In preparation for the future International Space Station (ISS), Chiao undertook two space exits (EVAs) to test new procedures for working on the ISS.

Due to his experience in the two outboard activities, Chiao trained intensively for set-up EVAs at the space station from summer 1997 and was appointed to the STS-92 mission . The Discovery brought the lattice structure Z1 and the coupling adapter PMA-3 to the ISS in October 2000 . The responsibility for the necessary external work lay in the hands of Chiao, who got off twice himself and worked on the station.

Shortly thereafter, Chiao was assigned to the eighth long-term crew of the ISS. As a substitute for Commander Foale , he prepared for a six-month stay in Earth orbit. In the autumn of 2002, a year before the start of Foale, Chiao was given its own command with ISS Expedition 10 . Originally planned as a three-person crew, the ISS crews were reassembled after the Columbia disaster in February 2003 and consisted of only two men. Chiao and board engineer Sharipov from Russia initially formed the replacement team for Expedition 9 .

In October 2004, both flew with Soyuz TMA-5 to the space station and worked there for six and a half months as the tenth permanent crew and the first crew, which consisted exclusively of Asians. Both space travelers left the ISS twice: at the end of January 2005 for seven and a half hours and two months later for six and a half hours. The return to earth took place in April 2005.

Chiao, who has been married to Karen Chiao since autumn 2003, left the US space agency in December 2005 after more than 15 years. Today he teaches at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge .

See also

Web links

Commons : Leroy Chiao  - collection of images, videos and audio files
personal data
SURNAME Chiao, Leroy
ALTERNATIVE NAMES 焦 立 中; Jiāo Lìzhōng
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American astronaut
DATE OF BIRTH August 28, 1960
PLACE OF BIRTH Milwaukee , Wisconsin