Guion Stewart “Guy” Bluford, Jr.: The Man Who Went to Infinity and Beyond
February 6, 2018
Born November 22, 1942 Guion Bluford, Jr. a.k.a. Guy, was raised to value academic success. As a member of the U.S. Air Force ROTC program, he went to Pennsylvania State University, graduating in 1964 with a degree in aerospace engineering.
He completed pilot training at Williams Air Force base in Arizona and, during the Vietnam War, flew 144 combat missions. During his time in the service, he won many medals, including the Vietnam Cross of Gallantry with Palm.
When the war was over, he enrolled at the Air Force Institute of Technology. It was here that Guy showed up and out and received both his master’s degree and PhD in aerospace engineering. He also became a staff development engineer as well as a branch chief of the Air Force Flight Dynamics Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio.
But the greatness didn’t stop there. Guy had put in an application. Not a regular shmegular application either. He had submitted an application to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (or a little thing some of like to call NASA) space program and, out of 10,000+ applications, was selection as 1 of 35 to join the new space shuttle team in January 1978.
In August 1979, he officially became a NASA astronaut. #BLACKEXCELLENCE
Four years later Guion S. Bluford, Jr. made history as the first African American to experience space travel. *AYYYYE* He was a specialist for mission STS-8 aboard the space shuttle Challenger where, over the course of 98 Earth orbits in 145 hours, he and the crew operated a Canadian-built robot arm and conducted several biophysiological experiments. The mission ended September 5, 1983.
His second trip to space was on October 30, 1985 as a specialist for mission STS 61-A aboard the Challenger among NASA’s largest crew to date. After completing 111 Earth orbits in 169 hours, Challenger landed at Edwards Air Force Base on November 6, 1985.
On January 28, 1986 in a separate mission, only 73 seconds into its flight, Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart, killing all seven crew members, including Ronald McNair, also one of the first black astronauts to go into space. Unfortunately, Ronald McNair also became the first African American to die on a space mission.
Bluford returned to the classroom following the Challenger explosion, receiving a master’s degree in business administration from the University of Houston in 1987. However, he was determined to help the NASA space program get back on course, and despite nearly being grounded due to a herniated disc, was back for mission STS-39 aboard the Discovery on April 28, 1991. The crew completing 134 orbits in 199 hours before landing on May 6, 1991.
Guion Bluford’s final trip to space came on December 2, 1992 for mission STS-53 aboard Discovery to carry a classified payload for the Department of Defense. The crew of five returned home safely on December 9, 1992.
Having amassed a total of 688 hours in space, the distinguished astronaut retired from both NASA and the Air Force in 1993. He was inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame in 1997 and the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame in 2010.
