Raja Chari is an American test pilot and NASA astronaut. As of 2021, he is rated as a Colonel in the United States Air Force (USAF). Raja Chari is of Indian descent.
Wiki/Biography
Raja Jon Vurputoor Chari was born on Friday, June 24, 1977, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States (age 45; as of 2022) and grew up in Cedar Falls, Black Hawk County, Iowa, United States. His zodiac sign is Cancer. In 1995, he completed his studies at Columbus High School in Waterloo, Iowa, USA. In 1999, he graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with a Bachelor of Science degree in Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Science (minor in Mathematics). He received his Master of Science in Aerospace Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 2001 as a Draper Fellow. After graduation, he received undergraduate pilot training at Vance Air Force Base, Oklahoma. He also participated in F-15E Strike Eagle training at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in North Carolina.
appearance
Height (approximately): 5′10″
Weight (approximately): 75kg
Eye color: black
Hair color: black
family
Parents and siblings
His father Sreenivas V Chari was born in Telangana and worked as an engineer in the United States. His mother Peggy is an American nurse and teacher. He has a younger brother named Krishna Chari.
Raja Chari and his family
wife and children
Raja is married to Holly Schaffter Chari, and the couple has three children. Speaking about his wife in an interview, Raja said,
She keeps our family going, keeps me and the entire squadron and the entire unit going, and then does her job day in and day out for the Veterans Administration. She is an amazing part of my life. It’s obviously the best decision I’ve ever made and I’m so lucky to have found her. “
Raja Chari with his brother, mother, father and wife (from left to right)
religion
Raja said in an interview that he was raised a Catholic and also followed Hindu traditions. He said,
From a religious perspective, I am Catholic. To my father’s credit, I didn’t realize I was any different from everyone else. I think they did a great job saying this is completely normal. Growing up, it took me a while to realize that my father wasn’t Catholic either. He is a Hindu. Never practiced it. Never baptized in church. He always went (to church) with us. We always went together as a family…my father never got away from his Hindu roots. It wasn’t until I got older that I realized he wasn’t Catholic and the church we grew up in wasn’t the church he grew up in. “
Profession
In November 2003, he was selected as an F-15E pilot with the 90th Fighter Squadron at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, Pacific Air Forces. He was designated F-15E IP in 2006 with 494FS at RAF Lakenheath, UK, followed by the US Naval Test Pilot School in Maryland in 2007 (as an Air Force Exchange Officer). In December 2008, he joined the United States Air Force (USAF) as an F-15 experimental test pilot, 40 FTS, Eglin AFB. In December 2012, he joined the U.S. Air Force as the SAF/RCO Program Manager, and in June 2015, he was appointed 461st Flight Test Squadron Commander/F-35 Integrated Test Force Director. In June 2017, he joined the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as an astronaut candidate.
Raja Chari with other NASA astronauts
He subsequently served as Director of the Commercial Crew Program Joint Test Team in 2019 and began serving as SpaceX Crew3 mission commander in June 2020. In December 2020, he was selected as a member of the Artemis astronaut team. The team was formed to make way for a lunar mission in 2024 that will put the first woman and next man on the lunar surface. In the same year, he was selected from NASA’s astronaut group “Group 22” to fly the space mission “SpaceX Crew-3” on November 11, 2021. He commanded the mission and was accompanied by NASA’s Kayla Barron and Tom Marshburn of NASA and Matthias Maurer of Germany.
Raja Chari and the SpaceX Crew-3 team
medal
While serving in the United States Air Force, he received various medals, including:
- Defense Meritorious Service Medal
- Medal of Merit
- Air Force Commendation Medal
- Air Force Achievement Medal
- Korean National Defense Service Medal
- Nuclear Deterrence Operations Service Medal
Facts/Trivia
- Raja Chari’s nickname is Grinder.
- He has had a keen interest in airplanes since he was a child. In an interview, he said about this incident,
I got it in my head that I really wanted to fly airplanes…Throughout high school, my goal was basically to get into the Air Force Academy. To achieve the goal of flying. I learned more about the idea of being a test pilot and that you could do both of those things. I love being a test pilot. That’s all I thought about. I get to indulge my passions and do what I love. When I became a test pilot, that was the first time I realized that—oh my god—it was possible to be an astronaut. In fact, this is not just a lofty goal, but a goal that I can work hard to achieve. From that point on, I started meeting people related to NASA. “
- Discussing Raja’s childhood love of airplanes, his mother said:
When he was about 9 or 10, he took some curtain hooks that I wasn’t using and bent them into different shapes…he would take them out and sell them to the kids in the neighborhood, telling them they were different types of airplanes . Other kids always buy them and they play with them. “
Categories: Biography
Source: HIS Education