Roger B. Chaffee

In addition to participating in the overall training program, Roger Chaffee was also tasked with working on flight control communications systems, instrumentation systems, and attitude and translation control systems in the Apollo Branch of the Astronaut office.

Quick Facts

Roger Chaffee was selected in NASA’s third group of astronauts in October 1963

On March 21, 1966, Chaffee was selected as one of the pilots for the AS-204 mission, the first 3-man Apollo flight.

Chaffee logged more than 2,300 hours flying time, including more than 2,000 in jet aircraft.

Chaffee was posthumously awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.

NASA Portrait of Roger Chaffee — S64-31447 (10 Sept. 1964) — Astronaut Roger B. Chaffee Editor’s Note: Astronaut Chaffee died in the Apollo/Saturn 204 fire accident at Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Jan. 27, 1967, along with astronauts Virgil I. Grissom and Edward H. White II.

apollo 1 chaffee white and grissom in suiting room at ksc — Apollo 1 crew sitting in suiting room at Kennedy Space Center

S66-51583 (June 1966)— Prime crew members announced by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the first manned Apollo 1 space flight practice water egress procedures in a swimming pool at Ellington Air Force Base (EAFB), Houston, Texas. Astronaut Edward H. White II rides life raft in the foreground. Astronaut Roger B. Chaffee sits in hatch of the boilerplate model of the spacecraft. Astronaut Virgil I. Grissom, third member of the crew, waits inside the spacecraft.

A display case dedicated to astronaut Roger Chaffee is shown inside the new tribute to the crew of Apollo 1 who perished in a fire at the launch pad on Jan. 27, 1967, during training for the mission. Gus Grissom, Ed White II and Chaffee were lost during the fire. The tribute at the Apollo/Saturn V Center at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center opened Jan. 27, 2017, 50 years after the crew of three was lost. It features numerous items recalling the lives of the three astronauts. It also includes the three-part hatch to the spacecraft itself, the first time any part of the Apollo 1 spacecraft has been displayed publicly. A version of the hatch after it was redesigned is also showcased as an example of improvements NASA made throughout the agency and to the Apollo spacecraft that would later carry astronauts to the moon.

Biography

Roger B. Chaffee

Learn more about Astronaut Roger B. Chaffee, including when he was selected by NASA to be an astronaut, his flight experience, education, background and more.

Learn More

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. — Astronauts, left to right, Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee, pose in front of Launch Complex 34 which is housing their Saturn 1 launch vehicle. The astronauts are scheduled for the Apollo Saturn 204 (Apollo 1) mission.