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Biography
Richard Alfred Farrimond (born 15 September 1947) is a British engineer, former army officer and astronaut.
Born in Birkenhead (Cheshire), he was educated Clifton College. He studied at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst and received a BS in telecommunications at the Royal Military College of Science, Shrivenham in 1972. At the end of his military career he was Lieutenant-Colonel in the Royal Corps of Signals of the British Army. After leaving the Army, he worked for British Aerospace and later for Matra Marconi Space. During his time with Astrium he spent time consulting at Kennedy Space Center.
In July 1984 he was chosen, from the candidates of RAF and Royal Navy, as the backup crew payload specialist to fly with the Space Shuttle mission STS-61-H, which was planned to deliver the British Skynet 4A satellite to space. However after the Challenger accident this space flight was cancelled, and he left the space program without having flown into orbit.