mission specialist

noun

U.S. Aerospace.

1. the crew member of a space shuttle who is assigned primary responsibility for carrying out operations related to the payload of the shuttle.

Word History and Origins

Origin of mission specialist¹

First recorded in 1975–80

Example Sentences

Mission specialist Christina Koch explained that the astronauts would be able to study the lunar surface in exquisite detail for a full three hours.

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Mission specialist Renata Rojas, who helped with the doomed trip as a volunteer, testified before the US Coast Guard on her interaction with the crew before the sub descended.

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Mission specialist Sarah Gillis also is an operations specialist at SpaceX who oversees the company’s astronaut training program.

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Mission specialist Christina Koch said Biden talked about a speech John F. Kennedy gave in 1962 on the mission to the moon, and he referenced the part where Kennedy said the U.S. would go to the moon because the goal was a challenge and “one we are unwilling to postpone.”

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“It takes a huge team of people to put four humans … to sling them around the moon and back and still have them breathing when they hit the Pacific. And we work with them every single day,” said mission specialist Jeremy Hansen, the Canadian member of the group.

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