Coloradan Nichole Ayers Chosen For NASA's New Astronaut Candidate Class
(CBS4) - NASA has selected a 32-year-old woman who calls Colorado home as one of 10 new astronauts as it looks ahead to the moon and Mars. The space agency on Monday introduced Nichole Ayers along with three other woman and six men during a ceremony at Ellington Field in Houston, home to Mission Control and the astronaut corps.
More than 12,000 applied for the coveted spots in the astronaut candidate class. The 10 selected are in their 30s and 40s, and face two years of training at the Johnson Space Center in Texas before becoming eligible for spaceflight. Training starts next month.
Ayers is a major in the U.S. Air Force and is one of the few American women who flies the F-22 Raptor. She led the first-ever all-woman F-22 formation in combat in 2019.
Ayers spent much of her youth in the Colorado Springs and Divide areas and graduated from the Air Force Academy in 2011.
From Alaska to Florida, the 10 women and men selected for our 2021 astronaut candidate class bring an incredible range of experience—which they'll use as we explore the Moon and expand our presence in low-Earth orbit.
— NASA (@NASA) December 6, 2021
Meet the team: https://t.co/P2roLmayhI pic.twitter.com/hyQV4PLKG2
NASA has accepted 360 people into its astronaut corps since the original Mercury Seven in 1959. The previous astronaut selection was in 2017.
With SpaceX sending astronauts to the International Space Station and other private companies launching tourists on short rides, and NASA's Artemis moon-landing program on the horizon, "we are in the golden age right now of human spaceflight," said NASA chief astronaut Reid Wiseman.
Nichole Ayers is a @usairforce fighter pilot from Divide, Colorado. pic.twitter.com/2LvOh6gOe3
— NASA's Johnson Space Center (@NASA_Johnson) December 6, 2021
NASA plans to put astronauts back on the moon no earlier than 2025.
Some of the programs Ayers could be chosen for upon graduation are as follows:
- research aboard the space station
- launching from American soil on spacecraft built by commercial companies
- deep space missions to destinations including the Moon
RELATED: Coloradans In Space: Who Are The 5 Active Astronauts Who Call Colorado Home?
(© Copyright 2021 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)