Ulf Merbold | |
|---|---|
 Official portrait forSTS-42, 1991 | |
| Born | (1941-06-20)20 June 1941 (age 84) Greiz, Thuringia, Germany |
| Status | Retired |
| Occupation | Physicist |
| Space career | |
| ESA astronaut | |
Time in space | 49 days |
| Selection | 1978 ESA Group |
| Missions | STS-9,STS-42,Euromir 94 (Soyuz TM-20/TM-19) |
Mission insignia |      |
Ulf Dietrich Merbold (German:[ʊlfˈdiːtrɪçˈmɛrbɔlt]; born 20 June 1941) is a German physicist and astronaut who flew to space three times, becoming the firstWest German citizen in space and the first non-American to fly on aNASA spacecraft. Merbold flew on twoSpace Shuttle missions and on a Russian mission to the space stationMir, spending a total of 49 days in space.
Merbold's father was imprisoned inNKVD special camp Nr. 2 by theRed Army in 1945 and died there in 1948, and Merbold was brought up in the town ofGreiz inEast Germany by his mother and grandparents. As he was not allowed to attend university in East Germany, he left forWest Berlin in 1960, planning to study physics there. After theBerlin Wall was built in 1961, he moved toStuttgart, West Germany. In 1968, he graduated from theUniversity of Stuttgart with a diploma in physics, and in 1976 he gained a doctorate with a dissertation about the effect of radiation on iron. He then joined the staff at theMax Planck Institute for Metals Research.
In 1977, Merbold successfully applied to theEuropean Space Agency (ESA) to become one of their first astronauts. He started astronaut training with NASA in 1978. In 1983, Merbold flew to space for the first time as apayload specialist or science astronaut on the firstSpacelab mission,STS-9, aboard theSpace ShuttleColumbia. He performed experiments in materials science and on the effects ofmicrogravity on humans. In 1989, Merbold was selected as payload specialist for the International Microgravity Laboratory-1 (IML-1) Spacelab missionSTS-42, which launched in January 1992 on theSpace ShuttleDiscovery. Again, he mainly performed experiments in life sciences and materials science in microgravity. After ESA decided to cooperate with Russia, Merbold was chosen as one of the astronauts for the joint ESA–RussianEuromir missions and received training at the RussianYuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center. He flew to space for the third and last time in October 1994, spending a month working on experiments on theMir space station.
Between his space flights, Merbold provided ground-based support for other ESA missions. For the German Spacelab missionSpacelab D-1, he served as backup astronaut and as crew interface coordinator. For the second German Spacelab missionD-2 in 1993, Merbold served as science coordinator. Merbold's responsibilities for ESA included work at theEuropean Space Research and Technology Centre on theColumbus program and service as head of theGerman Aerospace Center's astronaut office. He continued working for ESA until his retirement in 2004.
Ulf Merbold was born inGreiz, in theVogtland area ofThuringia, on 20 June 1941.[1][2] He was the only child of two teachers who lived in the school building ofWellsdorf [de], a small village.[3][4] During World War II, Ulf's father Herbert Merbold was a soldier who was imprisoned and then released from an Americanprisoner of war camp in 1945. Soon after, he was imprisoned by theRed Army inNKVD special camp Nr. 2, where he died on 23 February 1948.[3][5][6] Merbold's mother Hildegard was dismissed from her school by theSoviet zone authorities in 1945.[7][8][9] She and her son moved to a house inKurtschau [de],[10] a suburb of Greiz, where Merbold grew up close to his maternal grandparents and his paternal grandfather.[9]
After graduating in 1960 fromTheodor-Neubauer-Oberschule high school—nowUlf-Merbold-Gymnasium Greiz [de]—in Greiz,[3] Merbold wanted to study physics at theUniversity of Jena.[11][12] Because he had not joined theFree German Youth, the youth organization of theSocialist Unity Party of Germany, he was not allowed to study inEast Germany so he decided to go toBerlin, and crossed intoWest Berlin by bicycle.[12][13] He obtained aWest German high school diploma (Abitur) in 1961, as West German universities did not accept the East German one,[14] and intended to start studying in Berlin so he could occasionally see his mother.[11][15]
When theBerlin Wall was built on 13 August 1961, it became impossible for Merbold's mother to visit him.[16] Merbold then moved toStuttgart, where he had an aunt,[11] and started studying physics at theUniversity of Stuttgart, graduating with aDiplom in 1968.[1] He lived in a dormitory in a wing ofSolitude Palace.[17] Thanks to an amnesty for people who hadleft East Germany, Merbold could again see his mother from late December 1964.[11] In 1976, Merbold obtained a doctorate in natural sciences, also from the University of Stuttgart,[1] with a dissertation titledUntersuchung der Strahlenschädigung von stickstoffdotierten Eisen nach Neutronenbestrahlung bei 140 Grad Celsius mit Hilfe von Restwiderstandsmessungen on the effects ofneutron radiation on nitrogen-doped iron.[18] After completing his doctorate, Merbold became a staff member at theMax Planck Institute for Metals Research in Stuttgart, where he had held a scholarship from 1968.[8] At the institute, he worked on solid-state and low-temperature physics,[15] with a special focus on experiments regarding lattice defects inbody-centered cubic (bcc) materials.[1]
In 1973, NASA and theEuropean Space Research Organisation, a precursor organization of theEuropean Space Agency (ESA),[19] agreed to build a scientific laboratory that would be carried on theSpace Shuttle, then under development.[20] Thememorandum of understanding contained the suggestion the first flight ofSpacelab should have a European crew member on board.[21] The West German contribution to Spacelab was 53.3% of the cost; 52.6% of the work contracts were carried out by West German companies, including the main contractorERNO.[22]
In March 1977, ESA issued an Announcement of Opportunity for future astronauts, and several thousand people applied.[23] Fifty-three of these underwent an interview and assessment process that started in September 1977, and considered their skills in science and engineering as well as their physical health.[24] Four of the applicants were chosen as ESA astronauts; these were Merbold, ItalianFranco Malerba, SwissClaude Nicollier and DutchWubbo Ockels.[23] The French candidateJean-Loup Chrétien was not selected, angering the President of France. Chrétien participated in the Soviet-FrenchSoyuz T-6 mission in June 1982, becoming the first West European in space.[24] In 1978, Merbold, Nicollier and Ockels went toHouston for NASA training atJohnson Space Center while Malerba stayed in Europe.[25]
NASA first discussed the concept of havingpayload specialists aboard spaceflights in 1972,[26] and payload specialists were first used on Spacelab's initial flight.[27] Payload specialists did not have to meet the strict NASA requirements formission specialists. The first Spacelab mission had been planned for 1980 or 1981 but was postponed until 1983; Nicollier and Ockels took advantage of this delay to complete mission specialist training. Merbold did not meet NASA's medical requirements due to aureter stone he had in 1959,[28] and he remained a payload specialist.[29][30] Rather than training with NASA, Merbold started flight training forinstrument rating at a flight school atCologne Bonn Airport and worked with several organizations to prepare experiments for Spacelab.[31]
In 1982, the crew for the first Spacelab flight was finalized, with Merbold as primary ESA payload specialist and Ockels as his backup. NASA choseByron K. Lichtenberg and his backupMichael Lampton.[32] The payload specialists started their training atMarshall Space Flight Center in August 1978, and then traveled to laboratories in several countries, where they learned the background of the planned experiments and how to operate the experimental equipment.[33] The mission specialists wereOwen Garriott andRobert A. Parker, and the flight crewJohn Young andBrewster Shaw.[34] In January 1982, the mission and payload specialists started training at Marshall Space Flight Center on a Spacelab simulator. Some of the training took place at theGerman Aerospace Center inCologne and atKennedy Space Center.[35] While Merbold was made very welcome at Marshall, many of the staff at Johnson Space Center were opposed to payload specialists, and Merbold felt like an intruder there.[36] Although payload specialists were not supposed to train on theNorthrop T-38 Talon jet, Young took Merbold on a flight and allowed him to fly the plane.[37]
Merbold first flew to space on theSTS-9 mission, which was also called Spacelab-1, aboardSpace ShuttleColumbia.[38] The mission's launch was planned for 30 September 1983, but this was postponed because of issues with a communications satellite. A second launch date was set for 29 October 1983, but was again postponed after problems with the exhaust nozzle on the rightsolid rocket booster.[39] After repairs, the shuttle returned to the launch pad on 8 November 1983, and was launched fromKennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A at 11:00 a.m.EST on 28 November 1983.[40][41] Merbold became the first non-US citizen to fly on a NASA space mission and also the first West German citizen in space.[42][43] The mission was the first six-person spaceflight.[38][44]
During the mission, the shuttle crew worked in groups of three in 12-hour shifts, with a "red team" consisting of Young, Parker and Merbold, and a "blue team" with the other three astronauts.[38] The "red team" worked from 9:00 p.m. to 9:00 a.m. EST.[45] Young usually worked on the flight deck, and Merbold and Parker in the Spacelab.[38] Merbold and Young became good friends.[46] On the mission's first day, approximately three hours after takeoff and after theorbiter's payload bay doors had been opened, the crew attempted to open the hatch leading to Spacelab.[47][48] At first, Garriott and Merbold could not open the jammed hatch; the entire crew took turns trying to open it without applying significant force, which might damage the door. They opened the hatch after 15 minutes.[48]
The Spacelab mission included about 70 experiments,[49] many of which involved fluids and materials in amicrogravity environment.[50] The astronauts were subjects of a study on the effects of the environment in orbit on humans;[51] these included experiments aiming to understandspace adaptation syndrome, of which three of the four scientific crew members displayed some symptoms.[52][53] Following NASA policy, it was not made public which astronaut had developed space sickness.[54] Merbold later commented he had vomited twice but felt much better afterwards.[55] Merbold repaired a faulty mirror heating facility, allowing some materials science experiments to continue.[56] The mission's success in gathering results, and the crew's low consumption of energy and cryogenic fuel, led to a one-day mission extension from nine days to ten.[57]
On one of the last days in orbit, Young, Lichtenberg and Merbold took part in an international, televised press conference that included US presidentRonald Reagan in Washington, DC, and the Chancellor of GermanyHelmut Kohl, who was at a European economic summit meeting inAthens, Greece.[58][59][60] During the telecast, which Reagan described as "one heck of a conference call", Merbold gave a tour of Spacelab and showed Europe from space while mentioningdie Schönheit der Erde (the beauty of the Earth).[59][61] Merbold spoke to Kohl in German, and showed the shuttle's experiments to Kohl and Reagan, pointing out the possible importance of the materials-science experiments from Germany.[61]
When the crew prepared for the return to Earth, around five hours before the planned landing, two of the five onboard computers and one of three inertial measurement units malfunctioned, and the return was delayed by several orbits.[62]Columbia landed atEdwards Air Force Base (AFB) at 6:47 p.m. EST on 8 December 1983.[63] Just before the landing, a leak ofhydrazine fuel caused a fire in the aft section.[64] After the return to Earth, Merbold compared the experience of standing up and walking again to walking on a ship rolling in a storm.[65] The four scientific crew members spent the week after landing doing extensive physiological experiments, many of them comparing their post-flight responses to those in microgravity.[66] After landing, Merbold was enthusiastic about the mission and the post-flight experiments.[67]
In 1984, Ulf Merbold became the backup payload specialist for the Spacelab D-1 mission, which West Germany funded.[68][69] The mission, which was numberedSTS-61-A, was carried out on theSpace ShuttleChallenger from 30 October to 6 November 1985.[70] In ESA parlance, Merbold and the three other payload specialists—GermansReinhard Furrer andErnst Messerschmid and the Dutch Wubbo Ockels—were called "science astronauts" to distinguish them from "passengers" like Saudi princeSultan bin Salman Al Saud and Utah senatorJake Garn, both of whom had also flown as payload specialists on the Space Shuttle.[71] During the Spacelab mission, Merbold acted as crew interface coordinator, working from theGerman Space Operations Center inOberpfaffenhofen to support the astronauts on board while working with the scientists on the ground.[72]
From 1986, Merbold worked for ESA at theEuropean Space Research and Technology Centre inNoordwijk, Netherlands, contributing to plans for what would become theColumbus module of theInternational Space Station (ISS).[1] In 1987, he became head of the German Aerospace Center's astronaut office, and in April–May 1993 he served as science coordinator for the second German Spacelab mission D-2 onSTS-55.[1]
In June 1989, Ulf Merbold was chosen to train as payload specialist for the International Microgravity Laboratory (IML-1) Spacelab mission.[73]STS-42 was intended to launch in December 1990 onColumbia but was delayed several times. After first being reassigned to launch withAtlantis in December 1991,[74] it finally launched on theSpace ShuttleDiscovery on 22 January 1992, with a final one-hour delay to 9:52 a.m. EST caused by bad weather and issues with a hydrogen pump.[75] The change fromColumbia toDiscovery meant the mission had to be shortened, asColumbia had been capable of carrying extra hydrogen and oxygen tanks that could power the fuel cells.[76] Merbold was the first astronaut to represent reunified Germany.[76] The other payload specialist on board was astronautRoberta Bondar, the first Canadian woman in space.[76] Originally,Sonny Carter was assigned as one of three mission specialists; he died in a plane crash on 5 April 1991, and was replaced byDavid C. Hilmers.[77]
The mission specialized in experiments in life sciences and materials science in microgravity.[78] IML-1 included ESA's Biorack module,[79] a biological research facility in which cells and small organisms could be exposed to weightlessness and cosmic radiation.[80] It was used for microgravity experiments on various biological samples including frog eggs, fruit flies, andPhysarum polycephalum slime molds. Bacteria, fungi and shrimp eggs were exposed to cosmic rays.[78] Other experiments focused on the human response to weightlessness or crystal growth.[81] There were also tenGetaway Special canisters with experiments on board.[82] Like STS-9, the mission operated in two teams who worked 12-hour shifts: a "blue team" consisting of mission commanderRonald J. Grabe together withStephen S. Oswald, payload commanderNorman Thagard, and Bondar; and a "red team" ofWilliam F. Readdy, Hilmers, and Merbold.[83] Because the crew did not use as many consumables as planned, the mission was extended from seven days to eight, landing at Edwards AFB on 30 January 1992, at 8:07 a.m.PST.[82]
In November 1992, ESA decided to start cooperating with Russia on human spaceflight. The aim of this collaboration was to gain experience in long-duration spaceflights, which were not possible with NASA at the time,[84] and to prepare for the construction of theColumbus module of the ISS.[85][86] On 7 May 1993, Merbold and the Spanish astronautPedro Duque were chosen as candidates to serve as the ESA astronaut on the firstEuromir mission, Euromir 94.[84]
Along with other potential Euromir 95 astronauts, GermanThomas Reiter and SwedishChrister Fuglesang, in August 1993 Merbold and Duque began training atYuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center inStar City, Russia, after completing preliminary training at theEuropean Astronaut Centre, Cologne.[1][84] On 30 May 1994, it was announced Merbold would be the primary astronaut and Duque would serve as his backup.[84] Equipment with a mass of 140 kg (310 lb) for the mission was sent toMir on theProgress M-24 transporter, which failed to dock and collided withMir on 30 August 1994, successfully docking only under manual control fromMir on 2 September.[87]
Merbold launched with commanderAleksandr Viktorenko and flight engineerYelena Kondakova onSoyuz TM-20 on 4 October 1994, 1:42 a.m. Moscow time.[88] Merbold became the second person to launch on both American and Russian spacecraft[84] after cosmonautSergei Krikalev, who had flown on Space Shuttle missionSTS-60 in February 1994 after several Soviet and Russian spaceflights. During docking, the computer on board Soyuz TM-20 malfunctioned but Viktorenko managed to dock manually.[89] The cosmonauts then joined the existingMir crew ofYuri Malenchenko,Talgat Musabayev andValeri Polyakov,[84] expanding the crew to six people for 30 days.[88]
On boardMir, Merbold performed 23 life sciences experiments, 4 materials science experiments, and other experiments.[90] For one experiment designed to study thevestibular system, Merbold wore a helmet that recorded his motion and his eye movements.[91] On 11 October, a power loss disrupted some of these experiments[84] but power was restored after the station was reoriented to point the solar array toward the Sun.[90] The ground team rescheduled Merbold's experiments but a malfunction of a Czech-built materials processing furnace caused five of them to be postponed until after Merbold's return to Earth.[90] None of the experiments were damaged by the power outage.[92]
Merbold's return flight with Malenchenko and Musabayev onSoyuz TM-19 was delayed by one day to experiment with the automated docking system that had failed on the Progress transporter.[92] The test was successful and on 4 November, Soyuz TM-19 de-orbited, carrying the three cosmonauts and 16 kg (35 lb) of Merbold's samples from the biological experiments, with the remainder to return later on the Space Shuttle.[90] TheSTS-71 mission was also supposed to return a bag containing science videotapes created by Merbold but this bag was lost.[93] The landing of Soyuz TM-19 was rough; the cabin was blown off-course by nine kilometres (5.6 mi) and bounced after hitting the ground.[94][95] None of the crew were hurt during landing.[95]
During his three spaceflights—the most of any German national—Merbold has spent 49 days in space.[96]
In January 1995, shortly after the Euromir mission, Merbold became head of the astronaut department of the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne.[97] From 1999 to 2004, Merbold worked in the Microgravity Promotion Division of the ESA Directorate of Manned Spaceflight and Microgravity in Noordwijk,[1] where his task was to spread awareness of the opportunities provided by the ISS among European research and industry organizations. He retired on 30 July 2004, but has continued to do consulting work for ESA and give lectures.[97][98]
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Since 1969,[99] Ulf Merbold has been married to Birgit,née Riester and the couple have two children, a daughter born in 1975 and a son born in 1979.[8] They live in Stuttgart.[99]
In 1984, Merbold met the East German cosmonautSigmund Jähn, who had become the first German in space after launching onSoyuz 31 on 26 August 1978. They both were born in the Vogtland (Jähn was born inMorgenröthe-Rautenkranz)[2] and grew up in East Germany.[76] Jähn and Merbold became founding members of theAssociation of Space Explorers in 1985.[100] Jähn helped Merbold's mother, who had moved to Stuttgart,[8] to obtain a permit for a vacation in East Germany. AfterGerman reunification, Merbold helped Jähn become a freelance consultant for theGerman Aerospace Center.[100] At the time of theFall of the Berlin Wall, they were at an astronaut conference inSaudi Arabia together.[7]
In his spare time Merbold enjoys playing the piano and skiing. He also flies planes includinggliders. Holding acommercial pilot license, he has over 3,000 hours of flight experience as a pilot.[1] On his 79th birthday, he inaugurated the new runway at theFlugplatz Greiz-Obergrochlitz [de] airfield, landing with his wife in aPiper Seneca II.[101]
In 1983, Merbold received theAmerican Astronautical Society's Flight Achievement Award, together with the rest of the STS-9 crew.[1][102] He was also awarded theOrder of Merit of Baden-Württemberg in December 1983.[103][104] In 1984, he was awarded the Haley Astronautics Award by theAmerican Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics[105] and theOrder of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (first class).[1] In 1988, he was awarded theOrder of Merit of North Rhine-Westphalia.[106] Merbold received the RussianOrder of Friendship in November 1994,[107] the KazakhOrder of Parasat in January 1995[108] and the RussianMedal "For Merit in Space Exploration" in April 2011.[109] In 1995, he received an honorary doctorate in engineering fromRWTH Aachen University.[110]
In 2008, the asteroid10972 Merbold was named after him.[111][112]
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