Thomas P. Stafford

Thomas P. Stafford

Thomas Patten Stafford (born September 17, 1930) is a retired American Air Force Lieutenant general and former NASA astronaut. He flew aboard two Gemini space flights; and in 1969 was the commander of Apollo 10, the second manned mission to orbit the Moon and the first to fly a lunar module there.

In 1975, Stafford was commander of the Apollo-Soyuz flight, the first joint US-Soviet space mission. A brigadier general at the time, he became the first general officer to fly in space. He was the first member of his Naval Academy class to pin on the first, second and third stars of a general officer.

He made six rendezvous in space and logged 507 hours of space flight. He has flown over 120 different types of fixed wing and rotary aircraft and three different types of spacecraft.