User:Orion The Lugia

NASA Career

Orion was selected as a scientist-astronaut by NASA in August 1969. He completed astronaut academic training and then went on to fly on the classified Apollo 18 mission to the moon.

He was a mission specialist on STS-27 in 1983 and STS-44 in 1991. A veteran of three space flights in the Apollo and Shuttle programs and potential candidate for the Orion/SLS program, Orion has currently spent 573 hours 48 minutes, 20 seconds in space.

Spaceflight experience

Apollo 18

Orion in front of AS-514

Apollo 18 was the final mission of the United States' Apollo lunar landing program, and was the seventh and last landing of humans on the Moon. Launched at 9:58 AM Eastern Standard Time (EST) on February 11, 1973. It was a "J-type mission," which included a three-day lunar surface stay, extended scientific capability, and the third Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). Apollo 18 returned to Earth on February 23 after an approximately 12-day mission. It was the last use of Apollo hardware for its original mission. After Apollo 18, extra Apollo (spacecraft)|Apollo spacecraft were used in the Skylab and Apollo–Soyuz Test Project programs. Apollo 18 remains the most recent manned Moon landing and also the last time beings have traveled beyond low Earth orbit.

STS-27

STS-27 Space Shuttle Atlantis, was launched from KSC on December 2, 1988. The mission carried a United States Department of Defense payload, as well as a number of secondary payloads. After 68 orbits of the earth in 105 hours, 6 minutes, 19 seconds, the mission concluded with a dry lakebed landing on Runway 17 at Edwards Air Force Base, California, on December 6, 1988. The mission is noteworthy due to the severe damage Atlantis sustained to its critical heat-resistant tiles during ascent.