James Donald "Wxb" Wetherbee (born 27 November 1952) is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 Naval officer and a former NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

 astronaut

Astronaut

An astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....

. He is a veteran of six Space Shuttle

Space Shuttle

The Space Shuttle was a manned orbital rocket and spacecraft system operated by NASA on 135 missions from 1981 to 2011. The system combined rocket launch, orbital spacecraft, and re-entry spaceplane with modular add-ons...

 missions and is the only American to have commanded five spaceflight missions.

Wetherbee was raised in Huntington Station, New York

Huntington Station, New York

Huntington Station is a hamlet in Suffolk County, New York, United States. The population was 29,910 at the 2000 census....

. He earned a bachelors degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Notre Dame

University of Notre Dame

The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...

 before receiving his commission in the United States Navy

United States Navy

The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

. A Navy test pilot, Wetherbee worked extensively on the F/A-18 aircraft before being selected as an astronaut candidate in 1984. He piloted mission STS-32

STS-32

STS-32 was the 33rd mission of NASA's Space Shuttle program, and the 9th launch of Space Shuttle Columbia. Launching on 9 January 1990, it marked the first time since STS-61-C that Pad A at Kennedy Space Center's Complex 39 was used for a launch; it also marked the first use of Mobile Launcher...

 in 1990 and commanded missions STS-52

STS-52

-Mission parameters:*Mass:**Orbiter landing with payload: **Payload: *Perigee: *Apogee: *Inclination: 28.5°*Period: 90.6 min-Mission highlights:...

 (1992), STS-63 (1995), STS-86

STS-86

STS-86 was a Space Shuttle Atlantis mission to the Mir space station. This was the last Atlantis mission before it was taken out of service temporarily for maintenance and upgrades, including the glass cockpit.-Crew:-Crew notes:...

 (1997), STS-102

STS-102

STS-102 was a Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station flown by Space Shuttle Discovery and launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida...

 (2001), and STS-113

STS-113

STS-113 was a Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station flown by Space Shuttle Endeavour. During the 14-day mission in late 2002, Endeavour and its crew extended the ISS backbone with the P1 truss and exchanged the Expedition 5 and Expedition 6 crews aboard the station...

 (2002). The final three missions were dockings with Mir

Mir

Mir was a space station operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, at first by the Soviet Union and then by Russia. Assembled in orbit from 1986 to 1996, Mir was the first modular space station and had a greater mass than that of any previous spacecraft, holding the record for the...

 and the International Space Station

International Space Station

The International Space Station is a habitable, artificial satellite in low Earth orbit. The ISS follows the Salyut, Almaz, Cosmos, Skylab, and Mir space stations, as the 11th space station launched, not including the Genesis I and II prototypes...

; STS-113 was the last Space shuttle Mission before the Columbia disaster.

Wetherbee retired from NASA in January 2005 and currently works for BP

BP

BP p.l.c. is a global oil and gas company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the third-largest energy company and fourth-largest company in the world measured by revenues and one of the six oil and gas "supermajors"...

.

Wetherbee is married and has two children.

Special honors

In 2009, Wetherbee was inducted into the United States Astronaut Hall of Fame

Astronaut Hall of Fame

The United States Astronaut Hall of Fame, located just south of Titusville, Florida, honors American astronauts and features the world's largest collection of their personal memorabilia, focusing on those astronauts who have been inducted into the Hall; as well as Sigma 7, the fifth manned Mercury...

.

Records

• Only American to have commanded five missions in space.
• Has landed the Space Shuttle more times than anyone (five).
• Jim Wetherbee is the tallest person to fly in space (1.93 m)