Chris Cassidy has by no means diagrammed a Super Bowl-winning scheme like Invoice Belichick, however as each a Navy SEAL and NASA astronaut, he has helped create many “touchdowns” that historical past will endlessly bear in mind. Every of his game-winning drives have been a matter of life and demise, and the embellished captain led his groups to victory each mission.
His resume contains serving 11 years as a U.S. Navy SEAL, with two deployments in each Afghanistan and the Mediterranean. Cassidy additionally served as SEAL platoon commander at SEAL Workforce Three in California.
As an astronaut, Cassidy grew to become the five hundredth particular person in historical past to fly into area, touching down on three separate missions. He served as mission specialist aboard the Endeavor in 2009 and flown on missions in 2013 and 2020 aboard Soyuz. Cassidy is legendary for his most difficult mission in 2013, whereas conducting a spacewalk with companion Luca Parmitano, was pressured to close down a mission when water started filling his companion’s helmet. Cassidy’s fast determination making helped avert a catastrophic, presumably deadly end result.
Cassidy even discovered time to complete probably the most grueling athletic challenges, finishing the Ironman triathlon in 2014 – a feat which presumably fares no better than the third most spectacular for this American hero.
But his most important quick-thinking determination — the one which created the alternatives for each Annapolis and NASA, and maybe modified the course of historical past for the US House program, was made at a then-unassuming split-second second as a highschool senior.
Along with his Naval Academy software course of gone horribly incorrect and a army profession in query, Cassidy labored his manner into receiving a game-changing ultimatum with a solution that couldn’t wait until the subsequent day: Be a part of proper this second or lose this chance endlessly. Cassidy accepted and the remaining is historical past.
“In hindsight, scratching and clawing to get into the Academy set the stage for all of the issues I’ve been in a position to do,” Cassidy says. “There’s all the time key moments in your life once you don’t know what that vast inflection level in your life could come from. [If I hadn’t said yes], I’d by no means have learned about the SEALs, and I actually would by no means have met the primary SEAL astronaut, Invoice Shepherd.
