Alumna is first female to command space station

– October 24, 2007Posted in: Current News

	Whitson, pictured during her 2002 trip to the International Space Station, floats near the Microgravity Science Glovebox in the Destiny laboratory.
COURTESY OF NASA
Alumna Peggy Whitson ’86, a veteran NASA astronaut, returned to the International Space Station (ISS) in October and became its first woman commander. She served as the station’s first science officer during her initial ISS visit in 2002. Whitson traveled to the ISS aboard the Russian Soyuz TMA-11 earlier this month to command Expedition 16. She will remain on board until April 2008. While in space, Whitson will oversee the ISS’s receipt of European and Japanese space modules and an external Canadian robotic device. Other major events during her command will include two firsts: receiving science equipment and supplies from an unmanned cargo capsule and moving a 35,000-pound solar power module. Next year alumnus Takao Doi ’04 will join NASA’s 25th mission to the ISS.