Historical information

The assemblage was presented to the students of Ballarat College of Advanced Education (BCAE) by a NASA astronaut. The Australian Flag and NASA Astronauts crew patch were flown aboard the Orbiter Atlantis, STS-36, 28 February to 4 March 1990. Astronaut Pierre Thout's first flight was as a mission specialist on the crew of STS-36 which launched from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on February 28, 1990, aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis. This mission carried Department of Defense payloads and a number of secondary payloads. Following 72 orbits of the Earth in 106 hours, the STS-36 mission concluded with a lakebed landing at Edwards Air Force Base, California, on March 4, 1990, after travelling 1.87 million miles.