Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests/Ulf Merbold

Ulf Merbold

 * This is the archived discussion of the TFAR nomination for the article below. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as Wikipedia talk:Today's featured article/requests). Please do not modify this page.

The result was: scheduled for Today's featured article/November 28, 2023 by Gog the Mild (talk) 22:34, 28 September 2023 (UTC)



Ulf Merbold (born June 20, 1941) is a German physicist and astronaut. After growing up in East Germany, he studied physics at the University of Stuttgart in West Germany. In 1977, he became one of the first astronauts of the European Space Agency (ESA), and started astronaut training with NASA in 1978. On November 28, 1983, Merbold became the first West German in space and the first non-American to fly on a NASA spacecraft as payload specialist of the STS-9 mission aboard Space Shuttle Columbia. He participated in two further space flights, the STS-42 NASA mission in 1992 and a joint ESA–Russian Euromir mission to the space station Mir in 1994. In total, he spent 49 days in space, where most of his work was related to performing experiments in materials science and the life sciences. Merbold also provided ground support for other ESA missions and served as head of the German Aerospace Center's astronaut office. He worked for ESA until his retirement in 2004.
 * Most recent similar article(s): Lisa Nowak, 14 September 2023 (American astronaut). There's also Alan Shepard in the requests queue above. They are similar in being astronauts but dissimilar in this one being European for a change.
 * Main editors: Kusma
 * Promoted: 22 November 2022
 * Reasons for nomination: Anniversary of his first space flight. We have had a lot of American astronauts but not so many from other countries as far as I know
 * Support as nominator. —Kusma (talk) 08:38, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Support Balon Greyjoy (talk) 21:11, 9 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Support ~ HAL  333  18:43, 18 September 2023 (UTC)