O'Connor, Brian Daniel

Brian O'Connor was born on September 6, 1946 in Orange , California , but considers his hometown the city of 29 Palm in the same state where he graduated from high school in 1964. In 1968, he received a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering from the US Naval Academy (initial aviation training). In 1970, he received a master 's degree in aeronautics from the University of West Florida . In 1972 he graduated from the Graduate School of the United States Navy (in security) in Monterey , California and in 1976 - the Naval Test Pilot School , at the air base in Pataxent , Maryland . Brian and his wife Susie have two sons - Thomas and Kevin. The O'Connor family loves tourism , scuba diving , music and travel ^[1] .

O'Connor enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps (ILC) in June 1968 after graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis , Maryland . He became a naval pilot in June 1970. He served as a fighter pilot on the A-4 Skyhawk and AV-8A Harrier in various parts of the globe : in the United States, Europe and the Western Pacific . In 1975, O'Connor entered the Naval Aviation School and served as a test pilot at Pataxent , Maryland . During these 3.5 years he participated in tests of various types of aircraft, as well as with shortened and vertical take-off and landing, including the A-4 , OV-10 , AV-8 and X-22 . From June 1977 to June 1979 he was appointed senior officer in the Air Force Project, responsible for all flight tests of the Harrier aircraft, his responsibilities included planning, conducting tests, issuing recommendations and preliminary evaluation of all the first prototypes of the YAV-8B Harrier for the First Naval fleet. When in 1980 he was informed of an invitation to NASA as a candidate for astronaut , he served as deputy director of the AV-8 Procurement Program at the Naval Base in Washington , DC. It has a flight time of more than 5000 hours on more than 40 types of aircraft ^[2] .

O'Connor was invited to NASA as a candidate for astronaut in May 1980 as part of the ninth set. He began a course of general space training (OKP) in July 1980 at the Johnson Space Center in Houston , Texas . Upon its completion in August 1981, he received the qualification of "shuttle pilot." After training, O'Connor held various positions to support the crews of the first test shuttle flights, including as a test pilot in training simulators STS-1 and STS-2 . He supervised safety issues, accompanied STS-3 during landing, and was also in the STS-4 crew support group. He was a communications operator during flights from STS-5 to STS-9 . He also served as NASA Astronaut Corps Flight Safety Officer.

After the crash of the Shuttle Challenger and its crew in January 1986, O'Connor made a number of proposals to increase the safety of astronauts and over the next three years after the crash, he supervised the fulfillment of these tasks as a representative of the space agency. In the first days after the accident, he formulated and supervised the implementation of a set of works to collect debris at Cape Canaveral . Then he created and supervised the work at NASA headquarters, and was involved in communication between NASA and the presidential "Roger Commission" to investigate the disaster. In March 1986, he was appointed Assistant Program Manager for the Space Shuttles program (until February 1988), as well as the first chairman of the new Space Flight Safety Team (until 1989). Subsequently, from February 1988 to August 1991, he held the position of Deputy Director for Operations of Flight Crews.

• The first flight is STS-61B ^[3] , the Atlantis shuttle . From November 27 to December 3, 1985 as a pilot. During the STS-61B mission, 4 communication satellites were launched: Morelos-B (Mexico), Optus-A2 (Australia), Satcom-K2 (USA), OEX Target . Morelos-B and Optus-AUSSAT-2 were put into orbit with the help of PAM-D auxiliary engines, and for Satcom-K2, the PAM-D2 modification was first used to display heavier satellites. Two experiments were conducted on the assembly of structures in space: a structure close in shape to the "pyramid" and in shape close to the "high tower". The flight duration was 6 days 21 hours 6 minutes ^[4] .
• The second flight is STS-40 ^[5] , the shuttle Columbia . From June 5 to June 14, 1991 as a ship commander. The main objective of the STS-40 mission was experiments with the SpaceLab space laboratory (mainly in the field of biology ). The flight duration was 9 days 2 hours 15 minutes ^[6] .

The total duration of space flights is 15 days 23 hours 21 minutes.

O'Connor left NASA in August 1991 to become commander of a naval aviation squad at Pataxent River Airbase in Maryland . Over 10 months, O'Connor conducted 110 test flights as an AV-8B test pilot. In 1992, O'Connor returned to work at NASA headquarters in Washington, became deputy assistant Space Flight Administrator. He was tasked to immediately develop a comprehensive flight safety system, to work closely with Congress and the Administration to finance major modernization programs. Then, at the end of the summer of 1992, he was appointed head of the negotiation team that came to Moscow to lay the foundation for an ambitious and complex joint manned space program known as the Space Shuttle / World . In March 1993, O'Connor was appointed director of the reorganization of the space station. He and his team of 50 engineers, managers and international partners developed recommendations and changed the strategy, which led to significant cost savings (about $ 300 million per year), thereby helping to maintain the program without entering into a financial conflict with Congress. In September, he was appointed Acting Program Director for the Freedom Space Station. He held this post throughout the transition period from the Freedom project to the new program, the International Space Station . In January 1994, he was declared Director of the Program on an ongoing basis.

In April 1994, O'Connor was appointed Director of the Space Shuttle Program. In this capacity, he was responsible for all expenses of the program - $ 3.5 billion per year and the work of more than 27,000 people in the government and personnel for contractors. By the time he left NASA in March 1996, he was managing NASA's largest and most visible program. Twelve successful launches were made, including the first three flights to the Russian space station Mir . He planned and led an extensive restructuring of the program, saving taxpayers about $ 1 billion over five years. No less important was his contribution to increasing flight safety after the Challenger crash.

O'Connor left NASA in February 1996 to become an aerospace consultant. He also served on the Advisory Board for the Construction of Large Airships at Resources Corporation.

Awarded: Medal "For Space Flight" (1985 and 1991) and many others.

• List of astronauts and astronauts (and candidates) .
• List of US astronauts - participants in orbiting space flights .
• Timeline of manned spaceflight .

• Spacefacts biography of Bryan D. O'Connor
• Brian Daniel O'Connor in the Space Encyclopedia
• Bryan D. O'Connor Oral History . historycollection.jsc.nasa.gov. Date of treatment April 30, 2019.