April 24 - 29, 1990
Discovery

Crew & Mission

(STS031-12-031 - 29 April 1990) --- STS-31 crewmembers, wearing mission t-shirts, pose for their onboard crew portrait on the middeck of Discovery, Orbiter Vehicle (OV) 103. Mission Specialist (MS) Bruce McCandless II displays the mission insignia and MS Steven A. Hawley holds a model of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). Left to right are Pilot Charles F. Bolden (top left), Commander Loren J. Shriver, MS Kathryn D. Sullivan, McCandless, and Hawley. The crew is in front of the port side wall and the orbiter galley which is decorated with a HST art concept and a sign reading "HST is open for business!".

The Artwork

(October 1989) --- The mission insignia for NASA's STS-31 mission features the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) in its observing configuration against a background of the universe it will study. The cosmos includes a stylistic depiction of galaxies in recognition of the contribution made by Sir Edwin Hubble to our understanding of the nature of galaxies and the expansion of the universe. The STS-31 crew points out that is it in honor of Hubble's work "that this great observatory in space bears his name." The depicted Space Shuttle trails a spectrum symbolic of both the red shift observations that were so important to Hubble's work and new information which will be obtained with the HST. Encircling the art work, designed by the crew, are the names of its crewmembers.