Bjarni Valdimar Tryggvason

Astronaut

• Born: September 21, 1945
• Place of Birth: Reykjavik, Iceland
• Died: April 5, 2022

Contribution: Bjarni Valdimar Tryggvason was an Icelandic-born Canadian astronaut. Prior to his retirement from the Canadian Space Agency, he served as an engineer mission specialist and flew on two space shuttle missions, designing and conducting onboard experiments. Tryggvason applied his knowledge and experience to the area of teaching, leading courses on structural dynamics and random vibrations. He was also an accomplished inventor and writer.

Early Life and Education

Bjarni Valdimar Tryggvason was born on September 21, 1945, in Reykjavik, Iceland, but soon relocated to Canada with his family. He attended high school in Richmond, British Columbia, and in 1972, he earned his bachelor’s degree in applied science in engineering physics from the University of British Columbia. He completed postgraduate work in engineering and applied mathematics at the University of Western Ontario, where he also worked as a research associate on projects studying the effects of wind on aeroelastic and rigid structures.

In 1978, he worked as a guest research associate at Kyoto University in Japan and at James Cook University in Townsville, Australia. The following year, he became a lecturer in applied mathematics at the University of Western Ontario.

In 1982, Tryggvason joined a team of researchers at the Low Speed Aerodynamics Laboratory at the National Research Council. The team investigated the causes of the Ocean Ranger sinking; Tryggvason conducted aerodynamics tests to determine the wind loads that affected the oil rig during the disaster.

A Career as an Astronaut

In 1983, Tryggvason was selected to become an astronaut. He was the backup payload specialist for mission STS-52, space shuttle Columbia, which flew for eleven days in late October 1992. Tryggvason developed several devices used to conduct experiments during space flights, including the Large Motion Isolation Mount (LMIM), which flew on National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) missions, and the Microgravity Vibration Isolation Mount (MIM), which was placed on board the Russian Mir space station in 1996.

From 1981 to 1992, Tryggvason lectured part-time, teaching random vibrations and structural dynamics at the University of Ottawa and Carleton University. In 1997, he flew as a payload specialist on the space shuttle Discovery during its August 1997 mission. While on the flight, he tested the MIM and conducted experiments to determine the effect of spacecraft vibrations on fluid physics.

The following year, Tryggvason began two years of NASA training at the Johnson Space Center to become a mission specialist. Following this training, he worked as a representative for the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory, testing flight software before it was used on board the shuttles. He also worked on simulation at the International Space Station (ISS) Training Facility at the Johnson Space Center and as a member of the ISS Microgravity Analytic Integration Team. He served as a representative of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) on the NASA Microgravity Measurement Working Group.

Later Life and Death

From 2001 to 2003, Tryggvason took leave from the CSA and worked in the private sector, returning to the CSA in 2004. He retired from the CSA in 2008. In the years that followed, he served as an adjunct professor at the University of Western Ontario and taught short courses at such institutions as Scotland’s Abertay University. The founder of QDAQ Systems, a company devoted to designing data acquisition solutions, he held several patents and has published more than fifty scientific papers. Tryggvason died at the age of seventy-six on April 5, 2022.

Bibliography

Evans, Ben. Tragedy and Triumph in Orbit: The Eighties and Early Nineties. New York: Springer, 2012. Print.

Harland, David M. The Story of the Space Shuttle. New York: Springer, 2004. Print.

Melady, John. Canadians in Space: The Forever Frontier. Toronto: Dundurn, 2009. Print.

Melady, John. Maple Leaf in Space: Canada’s Astronauts. Toronto: Dundurn, 2011. Print.

Pearlman, Robert Z. "Bjarni Tryggvason, One of Canada's Original Astronauts, Dies at 76." Space.com, 6 Apr. 2022, www.space.com/canadian-astronaut-bjarni-tryggvason-obituary. Accessed 19 Sept. 2024.

Piantadosi, Claude A. Mankind beyond Earth: The History, Science, and Future of Human Space Exploration. New York: Columbia UP, 2013. Print.