Celebrating Women’s History Month: Most Recent Female Astronauts

Photo: NASA astronaut Christina Koch aboard the International Space Station. Photo credit: NASA. Article by Melissa Gaskill. Editor: Michael Johnson. NASA – March 3, 2021.

For Women’s History Month, NASA and the International Space Station celebrate the women who conduct science aboard the orbiting lab.

As of March 2021, 65 women have flown in space, including cosmonauts, astronauts, payload specialists, and space station participants. The first woman in space was Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova, who flew on Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963. The first American woman in space, Sally Ride, flew aboard the Space Shuttle STS-7 in June of 1983.

Other notable firsts:

• Roscosmos cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya was the first woman to participate in a spacewalk on July 25, 1984.
• NASA astronaut Mae Jemison flew on the Space Shuttle Endeavour’s STS-47 mission in 1992, becoming the first black woman in space.
• NASA astronaut Susan Helms was the first female crew member aboard the space station, a member of Expedition 2 from March to August 2001. […]

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