Sunita (Suni) Williams is getting trained for her third mission aboard the International Space Station. She is being prepared to be the pilot of the Crew Flight Test mission aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft – the first crewed flight for that vehicle.
The “crew arrival media event” will be held on Thursday, April 25 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The participants will include Jenn Kunz, associate director, NASA Kennedy, Dana Hutcherson, deputy program manager, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams.
Who is Sunita Williams?
Known for her record-breaking accomplishments, Sunita Williams was born in Euclid, Ohio, to Mumbai Indian-American neuroanatomist Deepak Pandya and Slovene-American Ursuline Bonnie (Zalokar) Pandya.
She was selected as an astronaut by the US space agency, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), in June 1998. She received her commission as an Ensign in the United States Navy from the United States Naval Academy in May 1987.
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As per NASA, Williams has spent a total of 322 days in space over the course of her two missions. With 50 hours and 40 minutes, she is second on the list of total cumulative spacewalk time by a female astronaut.
The previous two missions of Sunita Williams
1. Expedition 14/15 (December 9, 2006 to June 22, 2007: Sunita Williams had launched with the crew of STS-116 on December 9, 2006. She had then docked with the International Space Station on December 11, 2006.
Williams had served as a flight engineer in the Expedition 14 crew. While onboard, she established a world record for females with four spacewalks totalling 29 hours and 17 minutes, NASA said. Astronaut Peggy Whitson subsequently broke the record in 2008 with a total of five spacewalks.
Williams concluded her tour of duty as a member of the Expedition 15 crew. She returned to Earth with the STS-117 crew on June 22, 2007.
2. Expedition 32/33 (July 14 to November 18, 2012): Sunita Williams launched on July 14, 2012, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, along with Russian Soyuz commander Yuri Malenchenko and Flight Engineer Akihiko Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency,.
Williams had spent four months conducting research and exploration aboard the orbiting laboratory. During their Expedition, Williams and Hoshide performed three spacewalks to replace a component that relays power from the space station’s solar arrays to its systems and repair an ammonia leak on a station radiator.
“With 50 hours and 40 minutes, Williams once again held the record for total cumulative spacewalk time by a female astronaut (has since been overtaken by Peggy Whitson with 10 spacewalks). Williams has spent a cumulative total of 322 days in space,” NASA said.
What’s William’s third space mission
NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore will lift off aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket and dock at the orbiting laboratory, where they will stay for about a week.
The mission is the first crewed flight for the Starliner spacecraft.
The mission will test the end-to-end capabilities of the Starliner system, including launch, docking, and return to Earth in the western United States.
“Following a successful crewed flight test, NASA will begin the final process of certifying Starliner and systems for crewed missions to the space station,” the US space agency added.
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Published: 24 Apr 2024, 08:58 PM IST