CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The most experienced woman in space will check out of the International Space Station Saturday after a recording-breaking stay.
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NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson will have lived on the orbiting laboratory for 9 ½ months when she departs for Earth. She will have logged 655 days in space during her space career, more than any other American astronaut. She actually broke that record on April 24, according to NASA.
During this mission, Whitson, at 57 years old, became the oldest woman to visit space and completed her 10th spacewalk, more than any other spacewoman.
She arrived on the station for her third stay in November, and the mission was extended by three months in April.
“I love being up here,” Whitson said in April. “Living and working aboard the space station is where I feel like I make the greatest contribution, so I am constantly trying to squeeze every drop out of my time here.”
Whitson has been a record-breaker many times throughout her career as an astronaut. She was the first female commander of the Space Station in 2008, then the first woman to command the station twice. In 2009, Whitson became the first woman to become chief of the astronaut office.
However, the biochemist said she is not “overly comfortable” with the praise.
“I honestly do think that it is critical that we are continuously breaking records, because that represents us moving forward in exploration,” Whitson told NASA. “I feel lucky to have been in a position to take advantage of the opportunities that I have had, and yet I do acknowledge that my dedication and work ethic helped put me in those positions.”
Whitson is scheduled to depart Saturday at 5:58 p.m. from the Space Station inside a Soyuz spacecraft with fellow Expedition 52 crewmates American astronaut Jack Fischer and Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin.
The Soyuz capsule should land in Kazakhstan at 9:22 p.m. EDT.
Because of flooding caused by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, home to NASA’s Johnson Space Center and Space Station mission control, the agency is still figuring out when the NASA astronauts and their science samples will return to Houston.
JSC closed, except for a skeleton crew, on Aug. 25 and will reopen on Sept. 5, NASA said in a news release.
Whitson, who also lives in Houston, said Friday that her home is fine, but said she was grateful for the mission control members who slept on cots at JSC though the hurricane to support the station.
“Their sacrifices for the station and keeping things running up here are amazing,” she said. “And then there were so many others who 'called in' to support various meetings and decisions that had to be made to keep the program running, all the while worrying about the sheetrock that needed to be torn out of their flooded house.”
When she returns to Earth— and gravity-- Whitson said she is most looking forward to flushing toilets and pizza.