The First Black Female Space Station Crew Member in History... Will She Also Succeed in Landing on the Moon? [Reading Science]

NASA Launches Crew Dragon with 4 Astronauts Including Jessica Watkins
Fifth Black Female Astronaut, First to Enter ISS
Watkins Among Artemis Program Astronaut Candidates
Could Be First Woman and Person of Color to Land on the Moon

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bong-su] For the first time in history, a Black woman will serve as a crew member on the International Space Station (ISS). NASA announced that at 3:52 a.m. Eastern Time on the 27th, four astronauts, including Black woman Jessica Watkins, boarded SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft and arrived at the ISS. They will work on the ISS for about six months.

Notably, Watkins became the first Black woman among the crew members to board the ISS. There have been four Black female astronauts before Watkins. Mae Jemison, affiliated with NASA, was the first Black woman to participate in spaceflight in 1992. Since then, Stephanie Wilson, Joan Higginbotham, and civilian Sian Proctor have become Black female astronauts, but they participated before the ISS was established or took part in commercial space travel programs. Currently, NASA is nurturing two Black female astronauts, but neither has yet experienced spaceflight. Approximately 250 crew members have boarded the ISS so far, with fewer than 10 being Black.

Watkins majored in geology and environmental science at Stanford University and earned a Ph.D. in geology from the University of California. She was selected for NASA's astronaut program in 2017. During her stay on the space station, she will conduct research on Earth and space observation, biology, and medical studies on the effects of long-term space habitation on the human body.

Watkins is also gaining attention as one of the astronaut candidates for the Artemis program, humanity's second moon landing project scheduled to begin after 2025. If Watkins becomes an astronaut who lands on the moon under the Artemis program, she will be the first woman and person of color to do so in history. NASA conducted six manned moon landings from 1969 to 1972 under the Apollo program, but all 12 astronauts who participated were white men. Earlier this year, in an interview with the U.S. public radio station NPR, Watkins expressed her excitement, saying, "I have studied many photos taken on the lunar surface and samples collected during the Apollo program. Being able to go directly to the moon's surface and investigate the site as a geologist would be a dream come true."

In December 2020, NASA selected and began training a total of 18 astronaut candidates for the Artemis moon landing program. Only two?one man and one woman?will be finally selected. The group consists of nine men and nine women from diverse racial backgrounds. Among them is Korean-American Johnny Kim. Born in 1984 in Seosan, Chungnam, to an immigrant family, Kim served in the U.S. Navy SEALs special forces, completing 100 combat missions and receiving the Silver Star. After graduating from Harvard Medical School, he served as a Navy medical officer and was selected as a NASA astronaut in 2017.

Meanwhile, on the 15th, NASA announced an "equity action plan" in line with the Biden administration's racial equality policies. The plan aims to expand consideration for minority races in various procurement, donation, charity programs, and mission execution processes. There is growing interest in how this plan will be reflected in the selection results of the Artemis program's moon landing astronauts, where only one man and one woman will be chosen.