STS-52

STS-52 was Columbia's October-November 1992 Space Shuttle mission to deploy the LAGEOS-II laser-ranging satellite and operate a broad package of microgravity, materials-science, and Canadian technology experiments. NASA lists James Wetherbee as commander, Michael Baker as pilot, Charles Veach, William Shepherd, and Tamara Jernigan as mission specialists, and Steven MacLean as payload specialist. Columbia launched from Kennedy Space Center's Launch Complex 39B on October 22, 1992, and landed at the Kennedy Shuttle Landing Facility on November 1 after a ten-day flight. The crew deployed LAGEOS-II, a NASA and Italian Space Agency geodynamics satellite designed for long-term laser-ranging measurements of Earth's gravity field, crustal motion, and rotation. Columbia also carried U.S. Microgravity Payload-1, which supported experiments in materials processing, fluid physics, and combustion in orbit. STS-52 was also a major Canadian payload flight. MacLean worked with the CANEX-2 experiment package, including Space Vision System investigations that helped mature camera-based measurement and robotics-support techniques for later station operations. Creating this mission fills the missing production mission link for Michael Baker's STS-52 pilot flight and William Shepherd's third Shuttle mission while adding the full six-person crew.