Jack David Fischer (born January 23, 1974) is an American

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

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 ...

and a former

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

astronaut An astronaut (from the Ancient Greek (), meaning 'star', and (), meaning 'sailor') is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a List of human spaceflight programs, human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member of a spa ...

. Fischer was selected in June 2009 as a member of the

NASA Astronaut Group 20 NASA Astronaut Group 20 (The Chumps) saw the training of nine mission specialists, and five international mission specialists to become NASA astronauts. These 14 astronauts began training in August 2009 and officially graduated as astronauts on 4 ...

and qualified as an astronaut in 2011. He made his first spaceflight in April 2017, as a flight engineer for

Expedition 51 Expedition 51 (April – June 2017) was the 51st expedition to the International Space Station, which began upon the departure of Soyuz MS-02 on April 10, 2017, and concluded upon the departure of Soyuz MS-03 on June 2, 2017. Peggy Whitson, Oleg N ...

/ 52 on the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is a large space station that was Assembly of the International Space Station, assembled and is maintained in low Earth orbit by a collaboration of five space agencies and their contractors: NASA (United ...

Personal

Fischer was born January 23, 1974, in

Louisville, Colorado The City of Louisville () is a home rule municipality located in southeastern Boulder County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 21,226 at the 2020 United States census. Louisville began as a mining community in 1877, experienc ...

. He is married to Elizabeth Simonson from

Boulder, Colorado Boulder is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Home rule municipality, home rule city in Boulder County, Colorado, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 108,250 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the most ...

. They have two daughters. Fischer's father, Gary Fischer, is deceased, and his mother, JoBelle Fischer, still lives near Louisville, Colorado.

Education

In 1992, he graduated from Centaurus High School, in

Lafayette, Colorado The City of Lafayette ( ) is a home rule municipality located in southeastern Boulder County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 30,411 at the 2020 United States census. Geography Lafayette is located in southeastern Boulder ...

. He received his

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

degree in

Astronautical Engineering Astronautics (or cosmonautics) is the practice of sending spacecraft beyond Earth's atmosphere into outer space. Spaceflight is one of its main applications and space science is its overarching field. The term ''astronautics'' (originally ''astr ...

at the

U.S. Air Force Academy The United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) is a United States service academy in Air Force Academy Colorado, immediately north of Colorado Springs. It educates cadets for service in the officer corps of the United States Air Force and Un ...

in 1996. He completed a

Master of Science A Master of Science (; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree. In contrast to the Master of Arts degree, the Master of Science degree is typically granted for studies in sciences, engineering and medici ...

degree in

Aeronautics Aeronautics is the science or art involved with the study, design process, design, and manufacturing of air flight-capable machines, and the techniques of operating aircraft and rockets within the atmosphere. While the term originally referred ...

and Astronautics at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

in 1998.

U.S. Air Force service

Fischer is a

Colonel Colonel ( ; abbreviated as Col., Col, or COL) is a senior military Officer (armed forces), officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, a colon ...

in the

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 ...

. He attended Specialized Undergraduate Pilot Training at

Laughlin Air Force Base Laughlin Air Force Base is a facility of the United States Air Force located east of Del Rio, Texas. Overview Laughlin AFB, the largest Aviator, pilot training base in the US Air Force, is home to the 47th Flying Training Wing of the Air Educa ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

, in 1998. Afterwards he attended

F-15E Strike Eagle The McDonnell Douglas (now Boeing) F-15E Strike Eagle is an American all-weather multirole strike fighter derived from the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle. Intended for the Dual-Role Fighter (DRF) program (initially called Enhanced Tactical Fi ...

training at Seymour-Johnson Air Force Base,

North Carolina North Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, South Carolina to the south, Georgia (U.S. stat ...

, before being assigned as an operational pilot in the

391st Fighter Squadron The 391st Fighter Squadron is part of the 366th Fighter Wing at Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho. The squadron participated in combat missions in World War II and the Vietnam War, provided air defense in Korea and Japan from 1968 to 1971, an ...

Bold Tigers. Fischer served two combat tours in

Southwest Asia West Asia (also called Western Asia or Southwest Asia) is the westernmost region of Asia. As defined by most academics, UN bodies and other institutions, the subregion consists of Anatolia, the Arabian Peninsula, Iran, Mesopotamia, the Armenia ...

following September 11, 2001, and was part of

Operation Enduring Freedom Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) was the official name used by the U.S. government for both the first stage (2001–2014) of the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021) and the larger-scale Global War on Terrorism. On 7 October 2001, in response ...

and

Operation Southern Watch Operation Southern Watch was an air-centric military operation conducted by the United States Department of Defense from August 1992 to March 2003. United States Central Command's Joint Task Force Southwest Asia (JTF-SWA) had the mission of moni ...

over

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

and

Iraq Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...

. He is a 2004 graduate of the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School (Class 03B) at

Edwards Air Force Base Edwards Air Force Base (AFB) is a United States Air Force installation in California. Most of the base sits in Kern County, California, Kern County, but its eastern end is in San Bernardino County, California, San Bernardino County and a souther ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, and was presented with the Onizuka Prop Wash Award. In 2006, Fischer again returned to

, as part of the F-22 Combined Test Force and

411th Flight Test Squadron The 411th Flight Test Squadron is a United States Air Force squadron assigned to the 412th Operations Group of Air Force Materiel Command, stationed at Edwards Air Force Base, California. It conducted the Advanced Tactical Fighter program flyoff ...

testing the

F-22 Raptor The Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 Raptor is an American twin-engine, jet-powered, all-weather, supersonic stealth fighter aircraft. As a product of the United States Air Force's Advanced Tactical Fighter (ATF) program, the aircraft was de ...

. In 2008, he was selected as a Strategic Policy Intern in

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

While serving at

The Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters building of the United States Department of Defense, in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. The building was constructed on an accelerated schedule during World War II. As ...

, Fischer served in the Chairman's Action Group for the Chairman of the

Joint Chiefs of Staff The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) is the body of the most senior uniformed leaders within the United States Department of Defense, which advises the president of the United States, the secretary of defense, the Homeland Security Council and ...

and in the Space and Intelligence Capabilities Office with the Senior Advisor for the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics. Colonel Fischer is an Air Force

Command Pilot U.S. Air Force aeronautical ratings are military aviation skill standards established and awarded by the United States Air Force for commissioned officers participating in "regular and frequent flight",The standard by which flight status has be ...

with 3,000 flight hours in more than 45 types of aircraft.

NASA career

Fischer was selected in June 2009 as a member of the

and qualified as an astronaut in 2011. Fischer has worked in the

Capsule Communicator Flight controllers are personnel who aid space flight by working in mission control centers such as NASA's Christopher C. Kraft Jr. Mission Control Center or ESA's European Space Operations Centre. Flight controllers work at computer consoles ...

(CAPCOM) Soyuz, International Space Station Operations, International Space Station Integration, and Exploration branches of the Astronaut Office. In 2013, Fischer served as cavenaut into the

ESA CAVES CAVES, an acronym for Cooperative Adventure for Valuing and Exercising human behaviour and performance Skills, is a European Space Agency astronaut training course in which international astronauts train in a space-analogue cave environment. Desi ...

training in

Sardinia Sardinia ( ; ; ) is the Mediterranean islands#By area, second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, and one of the Regions of Italy, twenty regions of Italy. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, north of Tunisia an ...

, alongside

Jeremy Hansen Jeremy Roger Hansen (born January 27, 1976) is a Canadian astronaut, fighter pilot, physicist and former aquanaut. He was selected to join the Canadian Space Agency in the 2009 CSA selection along with David Saint-Jacques. Prior to his select ...

, Michael Barratt,

Satoshi Furukawa is a Japanese surgeon and JAXA astronaut. Furukawa was assigned to the International Space Station as a flight engineer on long-duration missions Expedition 28/ 29 (2011) and Expedition 69/ 70 (2023-2024). Medical career Furakawa graduated fro ...

, Aleksei Ovchinin and

Paolo Nespoli Major Paolo Angelo Nespoli (born 6 April 1957) is an Italian astronaut and engineer of the European Space Agency (ESA). In 2007, he first traveled into space aboard the Space Shuttle ''Discovery'' as a mission specialist of STS-120. In December ...

Expedition 51/52

Expedition 51 inflight crew portrait in the Cupola

Originally assigned to the Expedition 52/53 crew, he was reassigned to launch aboard

Soyuz MS-04 Soyuz MS-04 was a Soyuz spaceflight that launched on 20 April 2017 to the ISS. It transported two members of the Expedition 52 crew to the International Space Station. Soyuz MS-04 was the 133rd flight of a Soyuz spacecraft. The crew consisted ...

to the ISS in April 2017 as a flight engineer for

/ 52. Fischer launched aboard MS-04 on April 20, 2017. They docked with the station approximately 6 hours after launch, being the first crew of a Soyuz-MS series to make the shorter 6 hour rendezvous instead of the 2 day orbital rendezvous of the previous launches. On May 13, 2017, Fischer performed his first career EVA with

Peggy Whitson Peggy Annette Whitson (born February 9, 1960) is an American biochemistry researcher, and astronaut working for Axiom Space. She retired from NASA in 2018, after serving as Chief Astronaut. Over all her missions, Whitson accumulated a total of ...

. The EVA was shortened due to an issue ahead of the spacewalk where the spacewalkers had to share a SCU (Service Cooling Unit) line after the umbilical for Fischer's EMU suffered from a leak. His suit was in good shape, but the line could not be used. The impact on the EMU battery life meant the full EVA duration couldn't be conducted. They replaced an avionics box on the starboard truss called an ExPRESS Logistics Carrier (ELC), a storage platform. The duration was 4 hours and 13 minutes, and it was the 200th EVA to be performed on the ISS. On May 23, 2017, Fischer performed his second EVA with Whitson. They replaced a backup multiplexer-demultiplexer (MDM) unit that had failed on May 20, 2017. The duration was 2 hours and 46 minutes. Fischer returned to Earth along with

and

Fyodor Yurchikhin Fyodor Nikolayevich Yurchikhin () is a Russian cosmonaut of Pontic Greeks, Pontic Greek descent, engineer and Energia (corporation), RSC Energia test-pilot who has flown on five spaceflights. His first spaceflight was a 10-day Space Shuttle mi ...

aboard

on September 3, 2017. The overall duration of his stay in space was 135 days, 18 hours and 8 minutes. On May 24, 2018, he announced his early retirement from NASA to return to Air Force Service.

Subsequent career

Following retirement from NASA, Fischer served as the Chief Technology Officer for Collins Aerospace in Houston. In February 2021, Fischer joined

Intuitive Machines Intuitive Machines, Inc. is an American space exploration company headquartered in Houston, Texas. It was founded in 2013 by Stephen Altemus, Kam Ghaffarian, and Tim Crain, to provide commercial and government exploration of the Moon. Today the ...

as Vice President of Strategic Programs, and during their

IM-1 IM-1 was a robotic Moon landing mission conducted by Intuitive Machines (IM) in February 2024 using a Intuitive Machines Nova-C, Nova-C lunar lander. After contact with the lunar surface on February 22 the lander tipped to an unplanned 30 de ...

mission Fischer served as one of the Mission Directors.

References

External links

* * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Fischer, Jack D. 1974 births Living people People from Louisville, Colorado United States Air Force Academy alumni MIT School of Engineering alumni U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School alumni United States Air Force astronauts United States Air Force officers American test pilots American aerospace engineers Aviators from Colorado Crew members of the International Space Station Recipients of the Meritorious Service Medal (United States) Spacewalkers Military personnel from Colorado