mission:60s featured guest

A native of the Bronx & Yonkers NY and a graduate of Sacred Heart School (1966), Cardinal Hayes High School (1970), the City College of New York (BS-1974 & Ph.D. [Honorary]-1999), and Rutgers University (MS-1976); LCDR Mario Runco, Jr., USN-Retired, is a veteran of three Space Shuttle flights:  STS-44 (1991), STS-54 (1993), & STS-77 (1996) aboard the Space Shuttles Atlantis and Endeavour (2x). On his second mission, he performed a 4.5-hour spacewalk designed to test the limits of human endurance in space. As a NASA management astronaut, he was instrumental in the design of the ISS’s Cupola Observation windows, the U.S. Laboratory science window and the Window Observational Research Facility (WORF), both in the ISS Destiny Module, and the suite of windows on the Orion capsule.  On active duty in the Navy from 1978 to 1994, among other duties, he served as the meteorological/oceanographic officer aboard the amphibious assault ship USS NASSAU (LHA-4), AKA the“Harrier Carrier”, where he earned his designation as a Surface Warfare Officer; and as Commanding Officer of Oceanographic Unit 4 embarked in the naval research vessel USNS CHAUVENET (T-AGS-29) conducting hydrographic surveys of the Java & Flores seas and the Makassar & Sunda straits.  In his varied career, he also earlier served as a Research Hydrologist with the USGS, a New Jersey State Trooper, a mail clerk with the U.S.Post Office Dept./USPS, a certified financial planner, and as a plumber’s apprentice. Mario’s awards & decorations include the Defense Superior & Meritorious Service medals, the NASA Exceptional Service & Space Flight medals (3x), the National Defense Service medal, the Cold War Victory medal, the Navy Achievement medal, the Navy Pistol Expert medal, and the CCNY Class of 1906 Townsend Harris Medal (1993) & Class of 1938 Athletic Service Award (1972).