When we think of great astronauts we think of the protagonists of the beginning of the space race. We think of names like Yuri Gagarin, Neil Armstrong or Valentina Tereshkova. And although these 3 people played a leading role in the great space exploits of those years, today we also have remarkable figures, although less known. That is why we wanted to take advantage of today to talk to you about one of those figures: astronaut Christina Koch.
She was born in the United States, in the state of Michigan and surnamed Hammock, although she grew up more than 1,000 kilometers from there, in Jacksonville, in the state of North Carolina. As she told in an interview with a local media outlet in Jacksonville, since she was a little girl she already dreamed of being an astronaut . Apparently at the age of 5, she announced her desire to leave the Earth’s atmosphere (she probably did it in other words) to her parents, who have supported her ever since. To achieve this, he entered North Carolina State University, where he graduated twice, obtaining degrees in electrical engineering and physics in 2001. Also around this time, he completed a training that NASA offered to university students to introduce them to the operation of the agency and the world of space exploration.
After graduating with a master’s degree in electrical engineering, Koch began his professional career at NASA, specifically developing sensors for scientific instrumentation that would fly on several future missions . Seeking to expand his experience in field work, in 2004 he decided to join the US Antarctic Program, participating in several missions that would lead him to spend long periods investigating the Arctic and Antarctic regions . The longest of these missions lasted a year (thus including a winter stay), which Koch spent at the Amundsen-Scott station in Antarctica.
This is the only station located at the terrestrial south pole. It was built in 1956 and has been inhabited ever since by different scientific teams. The resident population varies from a maximum of 200 people in summer (which, remember, occurs here between December 21 and March 21) to a minimum of about 50 people in winter. In a statement he made to NASA about his experience in Antarctica, Koch said that “[This experience] meant spending entire months without seeing the sun, with the same equipment and without physical contact with the rest of the world. No mail, no fresh food. Loneliness, the absence of family and friends and the lack of new stimuli are things you must learn to live with.”
After her return from the South Pole, Koch combined her work in electrical engineering applied to space scientific instrumentation with several stays in both polar regions, until in 2013 she was selected in the class of 21 NASA astronauts . After two years of basic training as an astronaut, she was ready to participate in space missions. His training included specialized technical and scientific topics for the astronaut task, as well as intensive training in the operation of the hundreds of systems that make the International Space Station work, robotics training, piloting the T-38 supersonic plane or survival in remote environments. and aquatic.
On March 14, 2019, he flew into space for the first time, joining the ISS crew, along with cosmonaut Aleksey Ovchinin and astronaut Nick Hague. On March 29, two weeks after his arrival at the Station, the first extravehicular activity carried out by 2 women , Koch and Anne McClain, had been planned, but since he did not have 2 suits of his size, he had to be reassigned from McClain to Make. Luckily, the mistake was learned and on October 18 of that same year, Koch completed, together with astronaut Jessica Meir (from the same class of astronauts as Koch), the first space walk carried out entirely by women, a walk that would be repeated in two more times in the following months. During these, some damaged systems were repaired and improvements were installed in some of the observatories on board the ISS. Upon her return to earth on February 6, 2020, Christina Koch became the woman who had spent the longest consecutive time in space, having lasted a few hours more than 328 days. Stay that is being used to study the physical, biological and psychological effects of prolonged stays in space on women.
As evidenced by the foresight error that prevented McClain from carrying out that spacewalk with Koch, the gender perspective is necessary. This term, so hated by many people, in this case just means that: be aware that not all bodies respond the same to the conditions of space. If we focus on studying the response of a specific type of body under these conditions, we will hardly be able to guarantee the democratization of access to space in the coming decades. That is why initiatives such as that of the ESA to include people with functional diversity among its astronauts are so important.
However, Christina Koch’s career has only just begun. At the end of 2020, its presence was announced in the group of NASA astronauts that will be part of the future Artemis missions , with which the US, together with ESA and JAXA, intends to return to the moon in 2025. This mission has among His goals are to bring the first woman to the lunar surface . Maybe it’s Koch, or maybe she’s one of the other 8 astronauts that make up this initial group of 18 American astronauts. Be that as it may, Koch has many years left in which to break records and inspire new generations of future scientists and astronauts.
