NASA decided to send a new crew into space next month. And it will be for the first time in history that there will be a Native American woman abroad.
For this mission, the commander will be Astronaut Nicole Aunapu Mann, of the Wailakacki of the Round Valley Indian Tribes who will be responsible for all phases of flight.
Nasa confirmed that Nicole Aunapu Mann will be in the space station on the 29th of September.
Nicole Aunapu Mann told the newspaper Indian Country Today that “It’s very exciting,”.
She also added that “I think it’s important that we communicate this to our community so that other Native kids… realize that some of those barriers that used to be there are really starting to get broken down,”.
In her allocated 1.4kg for personal items she will take “a dreamcatcher that my mother gave me when I was very young” Nicole Aunapu Mann said.
Dreamcatchers means unity and provide protection according to the Indigenous Foundation.
She will be with three more colleagues on the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft she will be part of the Crew-5 mission.
Possibly she would go to the moon. Ms. Mann was selected to be in a pool of astronauts eligible for Nasa’s Artemis program in 2020 that will send humans to the Moon.
Her original hometown was in California and she completed mechanical engineering at Stanford University.
Letter Ms. Mann becomes a colonel in the Marine corps, flying various fighter aircraft. She was also deployed twice on aircraft carriers supporting combat operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and for that, she was awarded six medals for her honest service in the US military.
Nasa confirms that this will be the first expedition since she became an astronaut in 2013.
She is one of eight individuals from the 21st Nasa space traveler class, shaped for space station activities and expected future tasks to the Moon and Mars.
Ms. Mann will be joined by astronaut and pilot Josh Cassada, astronaut Koichi Wakata from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Russian cosmonaut Anna Kikina.
This is the fifth rotational mission to the International Space Station where the group will lead 250 logical tests that Nasa says will assist with helping life on Earth and get ready for human investigation past the planet.
John Herrington was the first Native American to fly into space, he is also an enrolled member of the Chickasaw nation. On his 13-day voyage, he carried the National flag and traditional flute.