November 19, 2021
Today in 1956, American astronaut Eileen Collins was born. Collins served as the first woman shuttle pilot on STS-63 (Feb 3-11, 1995) which included a rendezvous with the Russian Space Station Mir, and also STS-84 (May 15-24, 1997). On her third space shuttle flight, STS-93 (Jul 22-27, 1999), which deployed the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, she became the first woman space shuttle commander.
Eileen Collins looks over a procedure handbook while sitting in the commander’s seat of the Space Shuttle. On this 1999 mission, the shuttle was deploying the Chandra X-Ray Observatory above the Earth’s atmosphere. Credit: NASA