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Wendy Lawrence

Wendy Lawrence

Retired United States Navy Captain, Engineer, Former Helicopter Pilot & NASA Astronaut, Advocate for STEM Education

Wendy Barrien Lawrence was the first female graduate of the United States Naval Academy to fly into space..

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Bio

Full Bio

Wendy Barrien Lawrence is a retired United States Navy Captain, former helicopter pilot, an engineer, and a former NASA astronaut. She was the first female graduate of the United States Naval Academy to fly into space and she has also visited the Russian Space Station Mir. She was a mission specialist on STS-114, the first Space Shuttle flight after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster.

Her technical assignments within the Astronaut Office have included flight software verification in the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory (SAIL), Astronaut Office Assistant Training Officer, and Astronaut Office representative for Space Station training and crew support.

She next served as Director of Operations for NASA at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, with responsibility for the coordination and implementation of mission operations activities in the Moscow region for the joint U.S./Russian Shuttle/Mir program.

A veteran of four space flights, she logged over 1,200 hours in space. Lawrence was a Mission Specialist on the crew of STS-114. She was in charge of the transfer of supplies and equipment and operated the Space Station robotic arm on the Return To Flight mission. Captain Lawrence retired from NASA in June 2006.

She was given the 2019 U.S. Naval Academy Distinguished Graduate Award.

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Topics

Topics

  • Living and Working in Space
  • Dare to Dream!
  • Importance of STEM
  • Lessons Learned from the Columbia Accident
  • Team-building and Mission Accomplishment

Videos

Videos

Former Astronaut Wendy Lawrence keynote speaker at UW Bothell's 2012 commencement ceremony
Story: Wendy Lawrence, US female astronaut

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