Richard Nugent holds graduate degrees in astronomy from the University of South Florida. He worked at NASA’s Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston analyzing imagery from the LANDSAT satellites. He was also in the Space Shuttle program’s GNC (Guidance, Navigation and Control) division performing critical real time calculations of orbits and rendezvous maneuvers including instrument pointing to celestial objects. Richard has traveled with Paul Maley to 27 solar eclipses, both total and annular, many in support of the International Occultation Timing Association’s (IOTA) long term study on solar radius variations. He is the long time Executive Secretary of IOTA and the editor of IOTA’s book “Chasing The Shadow: The IOTA Occultation Observer’s Manual.”

Richard is a sought after speaker for astronomy clubs, star parties and organizations. He’s also a researcher on double and binary star systems, making measurements on them from his personal observatory located in Ft. Davis, Texas.