Don L. Lind
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| Don Leslie Lind | |
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| NASA Astronaut | |
| Status | Retired |
| Born | May 18, 1930 Midvale, Utah |
| Other occupation | Scientist |
| Rank | Commander, USN |
| Time in space | 7d 00h 08m |
| Selection | 1966 NASA Group |
| Missions | STS-51-B |
| Mission insignia |  |
Don Leslie Lind (born May 18, 1930 in Midvale, Utah) is an American scientist and a former NASA astronaut. He attended Midvale Elementary School and he graduated from Jordan High School (Sandy, Utah). Later he married Kathleen Maughan of Logan, Utah with whom he had seven children. His interests include amateur theatricals, play writing, and painting, but he is also an avid swimmer and skier.
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[edit] Education
Lind received a Bachelor of Science degree with high honors in physics from the University of Utah in 1953 and a Doctor of Philosophy degree in Physics in 1964 from the University of California, Berkeley where he did research on pion-nucleon scattering, a type of basic high energy particle interaction in the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory. He performed his post-doctoral study at the Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska from 1975 to 1976.
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Lind held the rank of Commander in the U.S. Naval Reserve. He served four years on active duty with the Navy at San Diego and later aboard the carrier USS Hancock. During that time he logged more than 4,500 hours of flight time, 4,000 of which were in a jet aircraft. He received his wings in 1957.
[edit] NASA career
From 1964, Lind worked at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center as a space physicist. He was involved in experiments to determine the nature and properties of low-energy particles within the Earth's magnetosphere and interplanetary space.
Lind applied for NASA's third group of astronauts but did not have enough flight hours, and was too old for the fourth group.[1] After the age restriction changed,[1] he was among the fifth group, the "Original Nineteen", selected in April 1966.
Lind served as backup pilot for Skylab 3 and Skylab 4 (the second and third manned Skylab missions) and was on standby for a rescue mission planned when malfunctions developed on Skylab 3. He was also a member of the Astronaut Office's Operations Missions development group, responsible for developing payloads for the early Space Shuttle Orbital Flight Test (OFT) missions, and the Canadarm. For Apollo he helped to develop the tools used on the lunar surface, and was a possible crewman of one of the canceled missions.
He finally flew as a mission specialist on STS-51-B (April 29 to May 6, 1985). Logging over 168 hours in space. Lind waited longer than any other American for his first spaceflight, 19 years.[1] 16 members of the Original Nineteen, as well as 14 in later astronaut groups, flew in space before Lind.
Lind left NASA in 1986, when he became a professor of Physics at Utah State University.
[edit] Spaceflight experience
STS-51-B, the Spacelab-3 science mission, launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on April 29, 1985. This was the first operational Spacelab mission. The seven men crew investigated crystal growth, drop dynamics leading to containerless material processing, atmospheric trace gas spectroscopy, solar and planetary atmospheric simulation, cosmic rays, laboratory animals and human medical monitoring.
Lind developed and conducted an experiment to make unique three-dimensional video recordings of the Earth's aurora. After completing 110 orbits of the earth, the Orbiter Challenger landed at Edwards Air Force Base, California, on May 6, 1985.
[edit] Awards and honors
Lind is member of the American Geophysical Union, the American Association for Advancement of Science, Phi Kappa Phi, and an Eagle Scout. He was also awarded the NASA Exceptional Service Medal in 1974.
[edit] LDS ecclesiastical service
In addition to his service as an astronaut, he has also served as a member of the ecclesiastical hierarchy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Lind served as a missionary for the church before the Navy.[1] While in Cache Valley as a professor at USU, he also served as a bishop. He has also served in subsequent assignments, including a term as a counselor to the president of the Portland Oregon Temple while his wife served as an assistant to the matron, and living in England for a year in 1998.
[edit] References
- ^ a b c d Don L. Lind oral history transcript, NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project, 27 May 2005.
- "Astronauts and the BSA". Fact sheet. Boy Scouts of America. http://www.scouting.org/Media/FactSheets/02-558.aspx. Retrieved 2006-09-06.
[edit] External links
Sources:
- http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/lind-dl.html
- http://www.physics.usu.edu/fachtmnj/dll.htm
- http://www.astronautix.com/astros/lind.htm
- LDS General Conference Talk given by Don Lind
- Igor Mikhailusenko's encounter with Don Lind in Utah
- Don Lind's speech to Utah School Children
- NASA Oral Biography about how Don Lind became an astronaut
- Spacefacts biography of Don L. Lind
