Who is Jessica Watkins? NASA astronaut set to command SpaceX Crew 13 mission to International Space Station | Hindustan Times

Jessica Watkins is all set to return to space, this time as commander of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-13 mission to the International Space Station. The geologist-turned-astronaut will lead a four-member international crew targeted to launch on 1st October.Despite it being her first time commanding a mission, Crew-13 will mark her second spaceflight. Watkins is well acquainted to the space station, where she first travelled to the ISS in 2022 as a mission specialist abroad NASA's SpaceX Crew-4, spending 170 days in orbit across Expeditions 67 and 68.Also Read | Alternative rock: Inside the global race to mine asteroidsWho is Jessica Watkins?Born in Gaithersburg, Maryland, Watkins grew up in Lafayette, Colorado, which she considers her hometown. Long before her journey carried her into space, her curiosity was rooted in the landscapes beneath her feet and far beyond them. She studied geological and environmental sciences at Stanford University before earning a doctorate in geology from the University of California, Los Angeles. Her research took her from Earth to Mars, examining the geological forces that can set enormous landslides in motion on both worlds. Her work eventually took her into NASA’s planetary science programs. Watkins has notable contributions to the Mars Science Laboratory mission, which operates the Curiosity rover on Mars and she has worked extensively at NASA's Ames Research Center and Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Prior to joining NASA’s astronaut corps, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the California Institute of Technology.Also Read | NASA spots ‘once-in-a-century’ crater on Moon's surface after massive asteroid crashWatkins successfully carried out the agency’s rigorous training program, which included spacecraft systems, spacewalks, robotics, flight training, survival skills and geology after being selected as a NASA astronaut candidate in 2017. Her first journey to the ISS was historic in its own right. During the Crew-4 mission, she became the first Black woman to join a space station expedition, marking a significant moment in human spaceflight.Jessica will soon return to the place where she first made her mark in orbit, but this time she will arrive with the role of a Commander. She will lead a four-member Crew-13 team alongside NASA astronaut Luke Delaney, Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov. Their stay aboard the ISS is expected to last roughly six months, combining scientific research with the everyday work of maintaining life in orbit.The countdown is now pointing towards October 1st, when NASA and SpaceX are targeting the mission’s launch. Crew-13 was originally expected to fly in September, but an oxidizer leak in Dragon’s propulsion system forced a delay. After the affected valve was replaced and the spacecraft cleared for the next stage, the mission has now moved into its final preparations.