Kenneth D. BOWERSOX

ISS Commander,
Soyuz TMA flight engineer,
Commander USN,
NASA astronaut

DATA AND PLACE OF BIRTH: November 14, 1956, Portsmouth, Virginia, but he sees Bedford, Indiana as his homeland. Father: Ronald Jean Bowersox died, mother: Eva Jean Bowersox born in 1934 lives in Bedford, Indiana.

EDUCATION: He finished Bedford high school in Bedford, Indiana in 1974, got the degree of bachelor in aeronautics engineering in the U.S. Navy Academy in 1978, the degree of master in mechanical engineering in Colombian University in 1979.

FAMILY STATUS: married.
Wife: Ann Cecilia Bowersox born in 1960.
Son: Matthew Douglas born in 1992,
son John Timothy born in 1995,
son Luck Anthony born in 1997.

HOBBIES: Windsurfing, air flights

WORK EXPERIENCE: In 1978 he started serving in the U.S. Navy and in 1981 he was nominated to a post of a Navy pilot. Later he was appointed to the 22nd fighter squadron to the U.S. Enterprise ship, on which he did his service as a pilot on Navy aircraft A-7E and made more than 300 landings on the aircraft-carrier by using a brake facility. After graduating from the U.S. Navy test-pilot school at Edward's Naval base, California in 1985 he was directed to the Navy Arms Center in China Lake, California, where he spent a year and a half in a position of a test-pilot flying on aircraft A-7E and F/A-18.

WORK EXPERIENCE AT NASA: In 1987 he was selected as a candidate to NASA astronauts. In August 1988 he finished a year training course for NASA astronauts. He worked in different areas including flight software testing in the Integrated Radio-Electronic Shuttle Laboratory, as a Technical Assistant of Crew Flight Operations Director, Representative of Astronauts Office on the Space Shuttle landing and roll back in turn, Head of the Flight Safety Department of Astronauts Office, during several Shuttle missions he communicated with the crew from MCC-H. Being a veteran of four space flights he spent more than 50 days in space. He flew as a pilot of the STS-50 crew in 1992 and STS-61 crew in 1993 and as a crew commander of STS-73 crew in 1995 and STS-82 crew in 1997.
Currently he is being trained for the space flight a member of the ISS-1 backup expedition crew as the ISS commander and Soyuz-TM flight engineer.
STS-50 (June 25 - July 9, 1992) was the first mission of the US Microgravity Lab and the first long-duration mission of the Shuttle. The crew of Columbia have performed a number of scientific experiments on board the Orbiter related to crystal growth and physics of liquids in microgravity. The mission duration was 13 days 19 hours 30 minutes 4 seconds.
STS-61 (December 2-13, 1993) was a mission to service and repair the Hubble Space Telescope. During the mission the four atronauts performed five EVAs. The mission duration was 10 days 19 hours 58 minutes 37 seconds.
STS-73 (October 20 - November 5, 1995) was the second mission of the US Microgravity Lab. The objective of the mission was to conduct studies in materials science, biotechnology, combustion, physics of liquids and to perform various scientific experiments in the Spacelab pressurized module. The mission duration was 15 days 21 hours 52 minutes 28 seconds.
STS-82 (February 11-21, 1997) was the second mission to service the Hubble telescope. During the mission, the crew of Discovery working in two teams performed 5 EVAs. Upon completion of the necessary repairs, the telescope was put into a higher orbit. The mission duration was 9 days 23 hours 37 minutes 9 seconds.
At present he is training for a space mission as the of the primary crew of ISS-6.

March 2002
Based on materials of Lindon B. Johnson Space Center, NASA, USA.