Gibson, Robert Lee (1946– )

US astronaut. His five space shuttle flights include commanding the Atlantis in June 1995 for the first shuttle docking with the Russian space station Mir. He served as chief of NASA's Astronaut Office 1992–94 and briefly as deputy director of NASA's Flight Crew Operations Branch in 1996. Gibson was selected as an astronaut in 1978 and left NASA in 1996 to pursue private business interests.