Michael Lloyd Coats (born January 16, 1946) is a former NASA astronaut (three spaceflights), raised in Riverside, California.

After training as an A-7E pilot, he was assigned to Attack Squadron 192 (VA-192) from August 1970 to September 1972 aboard the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk and, during this time, flew 315 combat missions in Southeast Asia.

He served as a flight instructor with the A-7E Readiness Training Squadron (VA-122) at Naval Air Station Lemoore, California, from September 1972 to December 1973, and was then selected to attend the U.S.

Naval Postgraduate School at Monterey, California, from June 1977 until his selection for the astronaut candidate program.

On his first mission, Coats was pilot on the crew of STS-41-D, which launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on August 30, 1984.

The crew earned the name "Icebusters" in successfully removing hazardous ice particles from the orbiter using the Remote Manipulator System.

Mission duration was 80 orbits and concluded with a landing at Edwards Air Force Base, California, on March 18, 1989.

Coats commanded a seven-man crew on STS-39, an unclassified eight-day Department of Defense mission launched from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida on April 28, 1991.