AEM commemorates the 38th anniversary of the first Mexican astronaut

MEXICO - The Mexican Space Agency (AEM), a decentralized agency of the Ministry of Infrastructure, Communications and Transport (SICT), commemorated the 38th anniversary of the first Mexican astronaut, Dr. Rodolfo Neri Vela, on the mission that put the Morelos 2 satellite into orbit.

The current director general of the AEM, and at that time 1985 director of the National Satellite System, Salvador Landeros Ayala, recalled the NASA mission "STS-61B", in which, aboard the space shuttle "Atlantis", Neri Vela would travel into space.

"Dr. Neri, a Communications and Electronics Engineer from UNAM, with a Master's degree in Telecommunications Systems from the University of Essex, England, and a PhD in the same country from the University of Birmingham, filled Mexico with pride and emotion," said Landeros.

On the night of November 26, 1985, he recounted, the space mission took off from Cape Canaveral, marking the day when Mexico would consolidate its entry into the select group of countries in the world with space activity, after putting the "Morelos 2" satellite into orbit.

"Since then, national satellites have been controlled entirely by Mexican personnel from national territory, and, today, the Government of Mexico has its third generation of satellites in orbit with the MexSat system," he added.

He also recognized the Mexican personnel who, in 1985, laid the foundations of modern telecommunications in the country, among them: Virginia Hernández; Humberto Flores González; Roberto Suárez Gómez; Julián Palomera Murillo; José Calderón Grajales, and José Thomsen Zenteno.