Challenger title
Login Contact UsSearchFAQsStore
about masthead
STS 51-L Crew

Francis R. (Dick) Scobee
Commander

Michael J. Smith
Pilot

Ron McNair
Mission Specialist

Ellison Onizuka
Mission Specialist

Judy Resnik
Mission Specialist

Gregory Jarvis
Payload Specialist

Christa McAuliffe
Teacher in Space participant

STS-51L Crew

Judith A. Resnik
Mission Specialist

Judy Resnik

Judy Resnik was selected as an astronaut candidate in January 1978, along with fellow Challenger crew members El Onizuka, Dick Scobee, and Ron McNair. It was also the first astronaut cadre containing women. After completing a one-year training and evaluation period, she filled a number of positions within NASA at the Johnson space Center, working on aspects of the Shuttle program. She also qualified for future shuttle flights as a Mission Specialist.

Her first mission was the maiden voyage of Discovery, which was launched on August 20, 1984, from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. During the mission, the crew deployed three communications satellites, conducted tests on a 105-foot solar array, and experimented with the new IMAX motion picture camera. The mission completed 96 Earth orbits.

The mission was also noteworthy because of her presence; Judy was the second American woman in space. She downplayed its significance: "I think the major significance of my being on this flight is not so much that I'm the second woman, but that I am the 40th or 45th, or whatever the number is, American astronaut to go on the Space Shuttle in a period of a couple of years, and how far we've come in a few years."

Judy graduated from Carnegie-Mellon University in 1970 with a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering. She said that she never hesitated to pursue an engineering career despite the few number of women in the field. "I was always good in math and science, and I liked it. Maybe I liked it because I was good in it." In 1977, she received her doctorate in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland.

Before joining NASA, Judy worked for RCA as a design engineer, conducting engineering support for NASA sounding rocket and telemetry systems programs. She was a biomedical engineer and staff fellow in the Laboratory of Neurophysiology at the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. She was also a senior systems engineer with Xerox Corporation.

Judy Resnik was born April 5, 1949, in Akron, Ohio. She logged 144 hours, 57 minutes in space, and was awarded the NASA Space Flight Medal in 1984.