page_title: Kathryn D. Sullivan
section_title: NASA career
hierarchical_section_title: Kathryn D. Sullivan / Career / NASA career
caption_attribution_description: English: Astronaut Kathryn D. Sullivan, 41-G mission specialist, uses binoculars for a magnifed viewing of Earth through Challenger's forward cabin windows.
context_page_description: Kathryn Dwyer Sullivan is an American geologist and a former NASA astronaut. A crew member on three Space Shuttle missions, she was the first American woman to walk in space on October 11, 1984. On June 7, 2020, she became the first woman to dive to the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the Earth's oceans. She was Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration after being confirmed by the U.S. Senate on March 6, 2014. Sullivan's tenure ended on January 20, 2017 with the swearing in of President Donald Trump. Following completion of her service at NOAA, she was designated as the 2017 Charles A. Lindbergh Chair of Aerospace History at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum., and has also served as a Senior Fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies.
context_section_description: Sullivan joined NASA in 1978 and was part of the first astronaut groups to include women. She performed the first extra-vehicular activity (EVA) by an American woman during Space Shuttle Challenger mission STS-41-G on October 11, 1984. Sullivan and mission specialist David Leestma performed a 3.5-hour spacewalk in which they operated a system designed to show that a satellite could be refueled in orbit. During their eight-day mission, the crew deployed the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite, conducted scientific observations of the earth with the OSTA-3 pallet (including the SIR-B radar, FILE, and MAPS experiments) and large format camera (LFC), conducted a satellite refueling demonstration using hydrazine fuel with the Orbital Refueling System (ORS), and conducted numerous in-cabin experiments as well as activating eight "Getaway Special" canisters. STS-41G completed 132 orbits of the Earth in 197.5 hours, before landing at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on October 13, 1984.
  In April 1990, Sullivan served on the crew of STS-31, which launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on April 24, 1990. During this five-day mission, crew members aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery deployed the Hubble Space Telescope, and conducted a variety of middeck experiments involving the study of protein crystal growth, polymer membrane processing, and the effects of weightlessness and magnetic fields on an ion arc. They also operated a variety of cameras, including the IMAX cargo bay camera, for earth observations from their record setting altitude of 380 miles. Following 76 orbits of the earth in 121 hours, STS-31 Discovery landed at Edwards Air Force Base, California, on April 29, 1990.  In 1985, she became an Adjunct Professor of Geology at Rice University.
  Sullivan served as Payload Commander on STS-45, the first Spacelab mission dedicated to NASA's Mission to Planet Earth. During this nine-day mission, the crew operated the twelve experiments that constituted the ATLAS-I (Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Science) cargo. ATLAS-I obtained a vast array of detailed measurements of atmospheric chemical and physical properties, which will contribute significantly to improving our understanding of our climate and atmosphere. In addition, this was the first time an artificial beam of electrons was used to stimulate a man-made auroral discharge.
  Sullivan left NASA in 1993. She flew on three space shuttle missions and logged 532 hours in space.
caption: Astronaut Kathryn Sullivan using binoculars to view the earth during STS-41-G
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