Portrait of Joe Engle Courtesy of NASA

Joe Engle is an American astronaut who was born on August 26, 1932, in Kansas. Before he became an astronaut, Joe Engle was a well-renowned Air Force pilot. He has logged over 11,600 hours of flight time in 140 types of aircraft.

Joe Engle became an astronaut in 1966. He has spent over 224 hours in space on 2 spaceflights.

In 1981, Engle made his first spaceflight as pilot of STS-2. The crew tested out the newly designed space shuttle Columbia. They proved that the Shuttle could be reflown. In 1985, Engle commanded Mission 51-I. During this mission, the crew deployed two satellites.