Brent Ward Jett Jr. (born October 5, 1958), ( Capt,

USN The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage o ...

, Ret.), is a retired American

naval officer An officer is a person who holds a position of authority as a member of an armed force or uniformed service. Broadly speaking, "officer" means a commissioned officer, a non-commissioned officer, or a warrant officer. However, absent contex ...

and aviator,

test pilot A test pilot is an aircraft pilot with additional training to fly and evaluate experimental, newly produced and modified aircraft with specific maneuvers, known as flight test techniques.Stinton, Darrol. ''Flying Qualities and Flight Testin ...

aerospace Aerospace is a term used to collectively refer to the atmosphere and outer space. Aerospace activity is very diverse, with a multitude of commercial, industrial and military applications. Aerospace engineering consists of aeronautics and astr ...

and

aeronautical engineer Aerospace engineering is the primary field of engineering concerned with the development of aircraft and spacecraft. It has two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. Avionics engineering is sim ...

, and

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

astronaut.

Personal life

Jett was born in Pontiac, Michigan, but considers Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to be his hometown. Married to Connie Jett of

Atlanta, Georgia Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,7 ...

. His hobbies are

water Water (chemical formula ) is an Inorganic compound, inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and Color of water, nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living ...

and

snow skiing Skiing is the use of skis to glide on snow. Variations of purpose include basic transport, a recreational activity, or a competitive winter sport. Many types of competitive skiing events are recognized by the International Olympic Committee ( ...

board sailing Windsurfing is a wind propelled water sport that is a combination of sailing and surfing. It is also referred to as "sailboarding" and "boardsailing", and emerged in the late 1960s from the aerospace and surf culture of California. Windsurfing ga ...

, boating,

running Running is a method of terrestrial locomotion allowing humans and other animals to move rapidly on foot. Running is a type of gait characterized by an aerial phase in which all feet are above the ground (though there are exceptions). This is ...

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

, and

squash Squash may refer to: Sports * Squash (sport), the high-speed racquet sport also known as squash racquets * Squash (professional wrestling), an extremely one-sided match in professional wrestling * Squash tennis, a game similar to squash but pla ...

Education

He received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University o ...

degree in Aerospace Engineering from the

United States Naval Academy The United States Naval Academy (US Naval Academy, USNA, or Navy) is a federal service academy in Annapolis, Maryland. It was established on 10 October 1845 during the tenure of George Bancroft as Secretary of the Navy. The Naval Academy ...

in 1981. He received a

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast t ...

degree in

Aeronautical Engineering Aerospace engineering is the primary field of engineering concerned with the development of aircraft and spacecraft. It has two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. Avionics engineering is sim ...

from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School in 1989.

Naval service

Jett was designated a Naval Aviator in March 1983, and reported to

VF-101 Strike Fighter Squadron 101 (VFA-101), also known as the "Grim Reapers", was a United States Navy Fleet Replacement Squadron (FRS) based at Eglin AFB, Florida. After the West Coast FRS for the F-14 Tomcat, VF-124, was disestablished in the mid-19 ...

Naval Air Station Oceana Naval Air Station (NAS) Oceana or NAS Oceana is a United States Navy Naval Air Station located in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Nowadays, the station is located on 23.9 km2. It has total of 250 aircraft deployed and buildings valued at $800 mil ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

for initial

F-14 Tomcat The Grumman F-14 Tomcat is an American carrier-capable supersonic, twin-engine, two-seat, twin-tail, variable-sweep wing fighter aircraft. The Tomcat was developed for the United States Navy's Naval Fighter Experimental (VFX) program after the ...

training. Upon completion of this training, he was assigned to

VF-74 VF-74, Fighter Squadron 74, ''Be-Devilers'' was an aviation unit of the United States Navy in service from 1944 to 1994. Originally established as VBF-20 on 16 April 1945, it was redesignated as VF-10A on 15 November 1946, redesignated as VF-92 on ...

and made overseas deployments to the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...

and

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by t ...

aboard the aircraft carrier . While assigned to VF-74, he was designated as an airwing qualified

Landing Signal Officer A landing signal officer or landing safety officer (LSO), also informally known as paddles (United States Navy) or batsman (Royal Navy), is a naval aviator specially trained to facilitate the "safe and expeditious recovery" of naval aircraft abo ...

(LSO) and also attended the

Navy Fighter Weapons School The United States Navy Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor program (SFTI program), more popularly known as Top Gun (stylized as TOPGUN), teaches fighter and strike tactics and techniques to selected naval aviators and naval flight officers, wh ...

(

TOPGUN The United States Navy Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor program (SFTI program), more popularly known as Top Gun (stylized as TOPGUN), teaches fighter and strike tactics and techniques to selected naval aviators and naval flight officers, wh ...

). Jett was selected for the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School – Test Pilot School Cooperative Education Program in July 1986, and completed 15 months of graduate work at Monterey, California, before attending the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School in June 1989. After graduation in June 1990, he worked as a project

at the Carrier Suitability Department of the Strike Aircraft Test Directorate, Naval Air Test Center, flying the

F-14A The Grumman F-14 Tomcat is an American carrier-capable supersonic, twin-engine, two-seat, twin-tail, variable-sweep wing fighter aircraft. The Tomcat was developed for the United States Navy's Naval Fighter Experimental (VFX) program after the ...

/ B/ D, T-45A, and

A-7E The LTV A-7 Corsair II is an American carrier-capable subsonic light attack aircraft designed and manufactured by Ling-Temco-Vought (LTV). The A-7 was developed during the early 1960s as replacement for the Douglas A-4 Skyhawk. Its design was ...

. Jett returned to the operational Navy in September 1991 and was again assigned to VF-74, flying the F-14B aboard USS ''Saratoga''. He has logged over 5,000 flight hours in more than 30 different aircraft and has over 450 carrier landings.

NASA career

Selected by NASA in March 1992, Jett reported to the Johnson Space Center in August 1992. After two years of various technical assignments in the Astronaut Office, Jett was assigned to his first mission as the pilot of STS-72. A year later he again served as pilot on

STS-81 STS-81 was a January 1997 Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'' mission to the Mir space station. Crew Mission highlights STS-81 was the fifth of nine planned missions to Mir and the second one involving an exchange of U.S. astronauts. Astronaut John B ...

. From June 1997 to February 1998, he served as NASA Director of Operations at the

Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center The Yuri A. Gagarin State Scientific Research-and-Testing Cosmonaut Training Center (GCTC; Russian: Центр подготовки космонавтов имени Ю. А. Гагарина) is a Russian training facility responsible for trai ...

Star City, Russia Star City (russian: Звёздный городо́к, ''Zvyozdny gorodok''The name "Zvyozdny gorodok" literally means "starry townlet".) is a common name of an area in Zvyozdny gorodok, Moscow Oblast, Russia, which has since the 1960s been ...

. Two years later he was the commander on STS-97. Finally, he served as the commander of Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'' on

STS-115 STS-115 was a Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS) flown by . It was the first assembly mission to the ISS after the ''Columbia'' disaster, following the two successful ''Return to Flight'' missions, STS-114 and STS-12 ...

. A veteran of four space missions, he has traveled over 12.1 million miles, and logged a total of 41 days, 18 hours, and 1 minute in space. Jett retired from the U.S. Navy in July 2007, but remained with NASA. In November 2007, he was appointed as Director of Flight Crew Operations. From November 2007 to February 2011, he was Director of Flight Crew Operations at JSC. From March 2010 to January 2013, Jett was the Deputy Manager for the NASA Commercial Crew Program. He retired from NASA in January 2013.

Spaceflight experience

STS-72

Space Shuttle ''Endeavour'', piloted by Jett, launched from

Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39B Launch Complex 39B (LC-39B) is the second of Launch Complex 39's three launch pads, located at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida. The pad, along with Launch Complex 39A, was first designed for the Saturn V launch vehicle, ...

, January 11, 1996, 09:41 UTC. During the 9-day mission the crew retrieved the Japanese

Space Flyer Unit The was a spacecraft which was launched by Japan on March 18, 1995.
Main Reference

Technical dat ...

launched by

NASDA The , or NASDA, was a Japanese national space agency established on October 1, 1969 under the National Space Development Agency Law only for peaceful purposes. Based on the Space Development Program enacted by the Minister of Education, Culture, ...

March 18, 1995. The crew additionally deployed and retrieved the Office of Aeronautics and Space Technology Flyer (OAST-Flyer) and performed two EVAs with the purpose of preparing techniques for assembling the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ( ...

. ''Endavour'' landed at the

Shuttle Landing Facility The Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) also known as Launch and Landing Facility (LLF) is an airport located on Merritt Island in Brevard County, Florida, United States. It is a part of the Kennedy Space Center and was used by Space Shuttle for ...

20 January 1996, 07:41 UTC.

STS-81

Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'', piloted by Jett, lifted off from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39B January 12, 1997, 09:27 UTCThe 10 day mission marked Jett's second space flight. The mission was the fifth in a series of joint missions between the U.S.

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program ...

and the Russian Space Station

Mir ''Mir'' (russian: Мир, ; ) was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, operated by the Soviet Union and later by Russia. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to&n ...

and the second one involving an exchange of U.S. astronauts. In five days of docked operations more than three tons of food, water, experiment equipment and samples were moved back and forth between the two spacecraft. ''Atlantis'' touched down at the Space Shuttle Landing Facility, January 22, 1997, 14:23 UTC.

STS-97

Space Shuttle ''Endeavour'' launched from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39B, 1 December 2000, 03:06 UTC STS-97 was Jett's third mission to space and first time in command. The primary objective of the mission was to deliver and install a 17 ton solar array to the International Space Station, in addition to batteries, radiators to provide cooling and a communications system for voice and telemetry. Assembly operations were conducted during 3 EVAs. ''Endeavour'' touched down at the Shuttle Landing Facility, 11 December 2000, 23:04 UTC

STS-115

Jett's fourth and final space mission commenced as Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'' launched from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39B, 9 September 2006, 15:15 UTC. STS-115 was the first assembly mission to the International Space Station after the ''Columbia'' disaster. The primary objective of the mission was to deliver and install the P3/P4 truss structure and solar array to the International Space Station during 3 EVAs. The mission concluded with the landing of ''Atlantis'' at the Shuttle Landing Facility, 21 September 2006, 10:21 UTC.

Organizations

Society of Experimental Test Pilots The Society of Experimental Test Pilots is an international organization that seeks to promote air safety and contributes to aeronautical advancement by promoting sound aeronautical design and development; interchanging ideas, thoughts and suggest ...

* Association of Naval Aviation * U.S. Naval Academy Alumni Association *

Association of Space Explorers The Association of Space Explorers is a non-profit organization with a membership composed of people who have completed at least one Earth orbit in space (above , as defined by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. It was founded in 1985, ...

Special honors

* Graduated first of 976 in the Class of 1981 at U.S. Naval Academy * Distinguished Graduate U.S. Naval Test Pilot School Class 95 * Awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross * Awarded the Defense Superior Service Medal and

Defense Meritorious Service Medal The Defense Meritorious Service Medal (DMSM) is an award bestowed upon members of the United States military by the United States Department of Defense. In the order of precedence of the United States Armed Forces, it is worn between the Purple ...

s * Awarded the

Navy Commendation Medal The Commendation Medal is a mid-level United States military decoration presented for sustained acts of heroism or meritorious service. Each branch of the United States Armed Forces issues its own version of the Commendation Medal, with a fifth ...

* Awarded the

NASA Exceptional Service Medal The NASA Exceptional Service Medal is an award granted to U.S. government employees for significant sustained performance characterized by unusual initiative or creative ability that clearly demonstrates substantial improvement in engineering, ae ...

* Awarded 4

NASA Space Flight Medal The NASA Space Flight Medal is a decoration of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. According to its statutes, it is awarded "for significant achievement or service during individual participation as a civilian or military astrona ...

s * Awarded the various other service awards * A portion of Northeast 56th Street in Jett's home city of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, has been designated "Brent Jett Boulevard" in his honor.

References

External links

*
Astronautix biography of Brent W. Jett Jr.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Jett, Brent W. Jr. 1958 births Living people 1996 in spaceflight 1997 in spaceflight 2000 in spaceflight 2006 in spaceflight American aerospace engineers United States Navy astronauts NASA people People from Pontiac, Michigan People from Fort Lauderdale, Florida United States Naval Academy alumni United States Naval Test Pilot School alumni Naval Postgraduate School alumni Aviators from Michigan United States Navy captains United States Naval Aviators American test pilots Recipients of the Distinguished Flying Cross (United States) Recipients of the Defense Superior Service Medal Recipients of the NASA Exceptional Service Medal Space Shuttle program astronauts Mir crew members Military personnel from Michigan