ALBION, Mich. — A former Albion College student is headed for outer space. Josh Cassada will be part of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission to the International Space Station.
According to NASA, Cassada was born in San Diego, California. He graduated from White Bear Lake Area High School in White Bear Lake, Minnesota in 1991.
Cassada later graduated from Albion College with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Physics in 1995. In 2000, he earned a Doctorate in Physics with a specialty in high energy particle physics from the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York.
Cassada was also commissioned as a naval officer in 2000, and became a naval aviator in 2001. In 2022, he began flying with the Fighting Tigers of VP-8, stationed at Brunswick Maine. He served in multiple operations including Iraqi Freedom, Enduring Freedom, and multiservice tsunami relief during Operation Unified Assistance. In 2011, he became the Chief of Flight Operations for DCMA Boeing Seattle.
Cassada is the co-founder of Quantum Opus, LLC, which provides high-speed, low-loss photon detectors for next generation experiments in quantum optics, optical quantum computation, single-photon communication, low-flux biophotonics, and remote sensing.
In 2013, Cassada was selected as one of eight members of the 21st NASA astronaut class.
Cassada is the first astronaut to have attended Albion College. The school is planning to have a launch viewing event that will be streamed for students, staff, and faculty on Monday, Oct. 3.
Update: The launch of the Crew-5 mission is now scheduled for Oct. 4 because of Hurricane Ian.
Update 2: The launch is now scheduled for Oct. 5 at noon.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime event and the Albion College community is so proud of Josh and all that he has accomplished,” said Albion College.
