{"id":21338,"date":"2025-09-24T01:19:02","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T17:19:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/polaris-dawn-crew-member-selected-as-nasa-astronaut-candidate\/"},"modified":"2025-09-24T01:19:02","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T17:19:02","slug":"polaris-dawn-crew-member-selected-as-nasa-astronaut-candidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/polaris-dawn-crew-member-selected-as-nasa-astronaut-candidate\/","title":{"rendered":"Polaris Dawn crew member selected as NASA astronaut candidate"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"img-border featured-image\">\n<p>\t<img width=\"100%\" src=\"https:\/\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;w=1600\" class=\"skip-lazy wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?w=320&amp;quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;ssl=1 320w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?w=640&amp;quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;ssl=1 640w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?w=1024&amp;quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;ssl=1 1024w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?w=1500&amp;quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;ssl=1 1500w\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\" data-attachment-id=\"43709\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/spaceexplored.com\/2025\/09\/22\/polaris-dawn-crew-member-selected-as-nasa-astronaut-candidate\/ascans-2-003\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?quality=82&amp;strip=all\" data-orig-size=\"2000,1000\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-title=\"ascans-2-003\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\n\n<p>Image: NASA<\/p>\n<p>&#8221; data-large-file=&#8221;https:\/\/spaceexplored.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2025\/09\/ascans-2-003.jpg?quality=82&amp;strip=all&amp;w=1024&#8243;><figcaption>\n\t\t\t\tImage: NASA\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Anne Menon, a mission specialist on the recent Polaris Dawn mission, was announced as an astronaut candidate by NASA today in Houston. She joins a growing list of former SpaceX employees who have joined the ranks of NASA\u2019s astronaut corps.<\/p>\n<p><span id=\"more-43708\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">NASA announced 10 new astronaut candidates who will go through about two years of training to be prepared for missions to the ISS, the Moon, and potentially beyond. The 10 new candidates include members from the military, the private space industry, and commercial aviation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Notably, Menon was selected to become yet another SpaceXer to don the iconic blue flight suits. However, this isn\u2019t her first rodeo in space; she was a mission specialist on Polaris Dawn and set the female flight altitude record. Polaris Dawn\u2019s mission, part of Jared Isaacman\u2019s Polaris Program, was to push the boundaries of SpaceX\u2019s Dragon spacecraft, flying at altitudes around Earth not done since the Apollo and Gemini missions.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Menon\u2019s selection to NASA\u2019s class of astronaut candidates is one of a growing number of selections that shows just how big an impact the private spaceflight industry is having on NASA. Before, most NASA astronauts came from military and research positions; now, there are many more avenues to becoming an astronaut than just becoming a test pilot.<\/p>\n<p>\t<span class=\"outbrain-ad-label\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t<script type=\"text\/plain\">\n\t\t\twindow.adSlotsConfig = window.adSlotsConfig || [];<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\tadSlotsConfig.push( {\n\t\t\t\tslotID: '\/1049447\/Outbrain',\n\t\t\t\tslotName: 'div-gpt-ad-outbrain-ad-43708',\n\t\t\t\tsizes: [300, 250],\n\t\t\t\tslotPosition: 'mid_article'\n\t\t\t} );\n\t\t<\/script><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Below is a list of the 10 candidates who will begin training to become NASA astronauts:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Ben Bailey<\/strong> \u2013 38, Chief Warrant Officer 3, U.S. Army<\/li>\n<li><strong>Lauren Edgar<\/strong> \u2013 40, U.S. Geological Survey<\/li>\n<li><strong>Adam Fuhrmann<\/strong> \u2013 35, Major, U.S. Air Force<\/li>\n<li><strong>Cameron Jones<\/strong> \u2013 35, Major, U.S. Air Force<\/li>\n<li><strong>Yuri Kubo<\/strong> \u2013 40, Vice President of Engineering, Electric Hydrogen<\/li>\n<li><strong>Rebecca Lawler<\/strong> \u2013 38, Test Pilot, United Airlines<\/li>\n<li><strong>Anna Menon<\/strong> \u2013 39, Senior Engineer, SpaceX\/Mission Specialist, Polaris Dawn<\/li>\n<li><strong>Imelda Muller<\/strong> \u2013 34, former Lieutenant, U.S. Navy<\/li>\n<li><strong>Erin Overcash<\/strong> \u2013 34, Lieutenant Commander, U.S. Navy<\/li>\n<li><strong>Katherine Spies<\/strong> \u2013 43, Director of Flight Test Engineering, Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21338","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21338"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21338\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}