Media invited to swearing-in of NASA's new explorers

Date: Tue, 8 Jun 2004 16:46:53 -0500
From:
Subject: Press Release #J04-028

June 8, 2004

James A. Hartsfield
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111



Report #J04-028

NOTE TO EDITORS: MEDIA INVITED TO SWEARING-IN OF NASA'S NEW EXPLORERS

Media are invited to watch as members of NASA's new class of astronaut
candidates report for duty at JSC on Monday, June 14. Afterward, the
astronaut candidates will be available for interviews in person and by
phone.

Media will be able to observe as the astronaut candidates are sworn in as
NASA employees. The ceremony begins at 1:30 p.m. CDT in one of the U.S.
space program's most famous landmarks, the room that served as Mission
Control for the Apollo moon landings. Media interested in attending the
ceremony or participating in individual interview opportunities later that
day should contact the JSC newsroom, 281/483-5111, no later than 5 p.m. CDT
Thursday, June 10.

Announced on May 6 at the Space Day ceremony in Washington, the 11-member
class will be the first astronauts focused from the start on realizing the
new Vision for Space Exploration to extend human presence across the solar
system, including a return to the Moon. Their training begins this month
with basic flight training at Pensacola Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Fla.
Three of the class of 11 are already qualified pilots; they will not attend
the flight training in Pensacola or the swearing-in ceremony on June 14.
They will join the class in August.

The NASA astronaut candidates will be joined in their training by three new
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronauts, who will also be
available the afternoon of June 14 for individual interviews.

The NASA astronaut candidate class includes six people training to be
mission specialists, two training to be spacecraft pilots, and three new
educator astronauts. The astronaut candidates attending the June 14
swearing-in include:

--Joe Acaba, a teacher from Florida who grew up in California
--Ricky Arnold, who has taught at international schools and grew up in
Maryland
--Chris Cassidy, a Navy SEAL who grew up in Maine and was stationed most
recently in Virginia
--Jose Hernandez, an engineer from California who works at JSC
--Tom Marshburn, a medical doctor who was born in North Carolina, raised in
Georgia, and currently works at JSC
--Dottie Metcalf-Lindenburger, a teacher from Washington state who was born
in Colorado
--Bobby Satcher, a medical doctor and Ph.D. who was born in Virginia and
practiced medicine most recently in Illinois
--Shannon Walker, a Ph.D. in astrophysics who works at JSC

The JAXA astronauts reporting for training a

--Satoshi Furukawa, a medical doctor from Kanagawa Prefecture
--Akihiko Hoshide, an engineer from Tokyo
--Naoko Yamazaki, an engineer born in Chiba Prefecture

Full biographies of the astronaut candidates are available on the internet
at:

http://www.nasa.gov/audience/formedi...can_media.html

More information on the Japanese astronauts is available from JAXA at:

http://iss.sfo.jaxa.jp/astro/profile_e.html

Video b-roll of the astronaut candidates will be fed on NASA Television
beginning with the Video File on Monday, June 14. Video of the swearing-in
ceremonies will feed as soon as it is available. NASA Television is
available on AMC-9, transponder 9C, C-Band, located at 85 degrees west
longitude. The frequency is 3880.0 MHz. Polarization is vertical, and audio
is monaural at 6.80 MHz. For information about NASA TV on the Internet,
visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about NASA on the Internet, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/

-end-


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Jacques :-)

www.spacepatches.info