Thomas Akers

Thomas Akers is a former American astronaut in NASA's Space Shuttle program. Born in 1951 and raised in Eminence, Missouri, he earned degrees in applied mathematics from the University of Missouri-Rolla, worked briefly as a high school principal and then joined the United States Air Force, graduating from the USAF Test Pilot School as a flight test engineer. He was selected for the astronaut program in 1987 and became an astronaut in 1988. A veteran of four shuttle flights, always as a mission specialist, he spent over 800 hours in orbit and more than 29 hours on spacewalks. His flights included STS-41, which deployed the Ulysses solar probe, and STS-49, the maiden flight of Endeavour, which captured and repaired the Intelsat VI satellite.