1. Piers Sellers was a veteran of three Space Shuttle missions.
14 Facts About Piers Sellers
1. 2.
Piers Sellers was born in Crowborough, Sussex, the second born of five boys for mother Lindsey.
3.
Piers Sellers's education started at Tyttenhanger Lodge Pre-preparatory School in Seaford, East Sussex, and Cranbrook School, Kent, from which he graduated in 1973 and where he was trained as a Royal Air Force cadet to pilot gliders and powered aircraft.
4.
Piers Sellers earned a Bachelor of Science degree in ecological science from the University of Edinburgh and a doctorate in biometeorology from the University of Leeds.
5.
Piers Sellers married Amanda Lomas, a nurse from Hebden Bridge, Yorkshire, before they moved to the US.
6.
Piers Sellers appeared in the Leonardo DiCaprio-produced documentary film Before the Flood.
7.
Piers Sellers began applying annually to become an astronaut in 1984, but his lack of US citizenship was a problem.
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Piers Sellers completed two years of training and evaluation and was initially assigned technical duties in the Astronaut Office Computer Support Branch, followed by service in the Astronaut Office Space Station Branch.
9.
Piers Sellers logged over 559 hours in space, including almost 41 EVA hours in 6 spacewalks.
10.
Piers Sellers retired as an astronaut in 2011 and then served as deputy director of sciences and exploration at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
11.
Piers Sellers brought a velvet patch of the University of Edinburgh crest into space on this flight, which was sewn to the graduating bonnet used during the university's graduation ceremonies.
12.
Piers Sellers took a four-inch wood sample of Sir Isaac Newton's apple tree, a piece from the original tree that supposedly inspired Newton's theory of gravity, along with a picture of Newton.
13.
Piers Sellers took an original watercolor portrait of Cranbrook School painted by Brenda Barratt.
14.
Piers Sellers was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 2011 New Year Honours for services to science, and in June 2016 received the NASA Distinguished Service Medal.