Military Women Become Astronauts

Something was different about the class of astronaut candidates introduced in January 1990. Eighteen men and five women emerged from almost 2,500 applicants as Astronaut Group 13; seven were pilots and 16 were mission specialists. That was not unusual.

The difference was that three of the women were military officers: U.S. Air Force Captain Susan J. Helms, U.S. Air Force Major Eileen M. Collins, and U.S. Army Captain Nancy J. Sherlock (later Currie, upon marriage). Moreover, Collins was the first woman to be named a pilot astronaut. For the first time, military women had completed all the eligibility requirements to be selected as prospective astronauts, and a woman had reached the top tier of the astronaut hierarchy.

Military men had been the core of the astronaut corps since the beginning. Many had attended the military academies, and most had been military aviators in war or test pilots in peace. They earned their credentials and experience in institutions that were closed to women. It took three decades to pry open the academies, pilot training programs, flight assignments, officer ranks, leadership positions, and test pilot programs to admit and advance women. Women were not admitted into military aviation training until initial “pilot projects” in the mid-1970s proved them equally capable. The military service academies did not admit women until required by law in 1976. The first woman to pass through the military jet aviation pipeline entered the Air Force Test Pilot School in 1989.

The three women officers who arrived for astronaut training in 1990 passed through each military gate as soon as it opened and came to NASA as soon as it was possible to do so as military aviators. Each of them was a pioneer, trailblazer, barrier-breaker—a “first woman.”

Susan Helms was admitted to the U.S. Air Force Academy in the first year it accepted women cadets (1976) and was among the first women to graduate in 1980. Armed with an aeronautical engineering degree, Helms then began her military career with a series of assignments during the 1980s, first to work on fighter weapon systems, then to graduate school for a master’s degree in aeronautics/astronautics, back to the Academy as an assistant professor of aeronautics, on to the Air Force Test Pilot School in California for the flight test engineer program, and then to Canada as an exchange officer working as a flight test engineer. One of the first women to complete the Air Force flight test engineer program, Helms was a distinguished graduate and was named the outstanding flight test engineer in her 1988 test pilot school class. She started thinking about becoming an astronaut while she was in graduate school and was encouraged to apply upon graduation as a flight test engineer. NASA accepted her immediately.

Eileen Collins entered the U.S. Air Force through the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) at Syracuse University in 1978 and began pilot training as one of the first women at Vance Air Force Base selected to be evaluated as pilots of military aircraft. Upon completing the course in 1979, she became a T-38 jet trainer instructor pilot—the second woman to do so and the only woman T-38 flight instructor at that base. Her next assignment was commander and instructor pilot for the C-141 transport aircraft; she flew troops and evacuated civilians during operations in Grenada in 1983, earning combat pay and a medal even though women were not yet officially allowed to fly in combat.

Collins then taught mathematics and was an instructor pilot at the Air Force Academy, before being admitted to Air Force Test Pilot School in 1989. A major in rank at the time, she was the senior member, and thus the leader, of her class—the first woman ever in that role. Collins was the second woman to graduate from this test pilot school, and NASA immediately selected her for the astronaut corps. Her 11-year trajectory as a military pilot was possible only because of policy changes in the 1970s that opened military pilot training, pilot assignments, and test pilot schools to women aviators. She came through the pipeline as soon as it was possible to do so.

Nancy Currie   entered the Army through ROTC and began rotary-wing pilot training in 1982. She then became an instructor pilot in the UH-1H “Huey” at the U.S. Army Aviation Center and held various leadership positions at the platoon and brigade levels as she was becoming a Master Army Aviator. The Army nominated her for astronaut candidacy, and she was interviewed for the 1987 class, but NASA asked her to take a position as a flight simulation engineer working with the pilot astronauts and the shuttle training aircraft. The Army agreed and she took that position. She then reapplied to become an astronaut and was selected as a mission specialist in 1990.

The paths of these three women through the late 1970s and 1980s paralleled the gradual falling of barriers to women in military aviation; they were in the right place at the right time to gain the necessary qualifications. As doors opened, they entered, and they succeeded. Their careers at NASA were likewise successful.

Helms flew on four Space Shuttle missions and an International Space Station expedition, set a spacewalk duration record, and was the first woman to reside on the International Space Station for a long-duration mission. She left NASA as a colonel, returned to the Air Force, and retired as a three-star lieutenant general.

Collins flew twice as the pilot of Space Shuttle missions and twice as commander—the first woman in each role. She flew on two missions to Russia’s Mir space station, one mission to deploy the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the return-to-flight mission to the International Space Station after the Columbia tragedy. The last barrier to being a space pilot disappeared when Collins flew. She retired as a colonel.

Currie retired as a colonel after flying on four Space Shuttle missions, including the first assembly mission for the International Space Station and the fourth Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission. She was the flight engineer and primary robotic arm operator on all of her missions, the only woman and possibly the only astronaut with such a consistent record in those two demanding positions.

The 1990 astronaut selection was a landmark. Women were now able to enter the astronaut corps on par with male military officers. The position of mission specialist had made it possible for women scientists and engineers to be selected competitively with men, but until 1990 all the women were civilians when chosen, whereas many of the mission specialist men were military aviators and officers. Their rank had value in the military-like culture of the Astronaut Office, where, informally at least, military astronauts were of a higher caste—more often the leaders—than civilians and women.

The arrival of Helms and Currie signaled a gender leveling in the mission specialist group. Both held officer rank and their credentials were comparable to those of the military men. Among pilot astronauts (male and mostly military), Collins met the military standards to be respected as an equal and challenge any gender bias. Arguably, the presence of military women, as well as civilian women and people of color, helped the astronaut corps become more egalitarian.

Together, Collins, Helms, and Currie were the leading edge of a wave of military women aviators reaching elite levels who decided to pursue careers in the astronaut corps. Since 1990, twenty more women military officers have become astronauts. They represent all the military services and academies except the Coast Guard. They are test pilots and combat pilots, flight engineers, and one is a submariner; they have flown the most advanced aircraft; they are experienced leaders. Men had a 30-year head start in moving from the military services into space, but women have caught up and taken their place in space, where they continue to excel.