NASA: Astronaut Christina Koch will make the longest female spaceflight in history, at 328 days - Houston Chronicle

NASA astronaut Christina Koch received some exciting news one month into her stay on the International Space Station: the space agency officially was extending her mission to February 2020.

"One month down. Ten to go. Today the possibility has become reality," Koch, 40, tweeted Wednesday morning. "Privileged to contribute my best every single day of it."

Koch arrived on the space station March 14. Her mission extension makes history: it will be the longest female spaceflight in history, at 328 days.

If everything goes according to plan, Koch will beat the current record held by retired astronaut Peggy Whitson, who lived on the space station for 288 days in 2016 and 2017.

Koch will not beat former astronaut Scott Kelly's record for longest single spaceflight of a NASA astronaut -- 340 days -- set in 2015 and 2016.

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Here are the current flight plans for the International Space Station, as announced by NASA:

June 24: NASA's Anne McClain, Canada's David Saint-Jacques and Russia's Oleg Kononenko -- currently living on the space station -- will return to Earth. NASA's Christina Koch and Nick Hague, as well as Russia's Alexey Ovchinin, will remain aboard the space station.
July 20 (the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing): NASA's Andrew Morgan, European Space Agency's Luca Parmitano, and Russia's Alexander Skvortsov launch to the space station, joining Koch, Hague and Ovchinin.
Sept. 25: NASA's Jessica Meir, Russia's Oleg Skripochka and United Arab Emirates' Hazzaa Ali Almansoori, launch to the space station.
Oct. 3: Hague, Ovchinin Almansoori return to Earth.
February 2020: Koch, Parmitano and Skvortsov return home.
Spring 2020: Morgan, Meir and Skripochka return home.

Source: NASA

NASA said Wednesday morning that Koch's extended mission will help scientists compile more data about the effects of long-duration spaceflight on humans. That information is more important than ever as NASA makes plans to return to the moon in 2024 and, eventually, travel to Mars.

"Astronauts demonstrate amazing resilience and adaptability in response to long duration spaceflight exposure," said Jennifer Fogarty, chief scientist of the Human Research Program at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. "This will enable successful exploration missions with healthy, performance-ready astronauts."

Koch was selected as an astronaut in 2013. She was born in Michigan, but considers North Carolina her home state. She has three degrees from North Carolina State University: a master's degree in electrical engineering and two bachelor's degrees in electrical engineering physics.

She arrived on the space station in March alongside NASA's Nick Hague and Russia's Alexey Ovchinin. The March mission was Hague and Ovchinin's second attempt to live on the space station: In October, they were robbed of their chance after the Russian Soyuz spacecraft transporting them there had to make an emergency landing because of a rocket booster failure.

She was supposed to participate in NASA's first all-female spacewalk in its 60 year history last month, but it was scrubbed because there were not enough suits to fit both her and NASA's Anne McClain.

Also on Wednesday, NASA announced that United Arab Emirates astronaut Hazzaa Ali Almansoori will fly to the space station Sept. 25, returning home Oct. 3 alongside Hague and Ovchinin.

Alex Stuckey writes about NASA and science for the Houston Chronicle. You can reach her at alex.stuckey@chron.com or Twitter.com/alexdstuckey.

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