Oct. 10, 2007 -- NASA has flown dozens of women in space before but only one has earned the rank of mission commander. That's about to change.
Women are in charge of not only the next shuttle crew, but also for the first time aboard the International Space Station as well.
"This is fun for us. We're getting a kick out of it that we're both going to be up there together," said Pamela Melroy, who will command the next mission of space shuttle Discovery.
She and her six crewmates are at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida this week for a launch dress rehearsal. Liftoff is targeted for Oct. 23.
Meanwhile in the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson is preparing for blastoff this morning aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket. Whitson will take over command of the station when she and her crewmates arrive on Friday.
"I think it's special that I get the opportunity to play that role," Whitson said in a preflight interview. "I have an opportunity to demonstrate how many other women also work at NASA."
She won't have to search far. Three of the lead flight directors overseeing the station and upcoming shuttle missions are women as well.
"I see myself as part of a chain of events," Melroy told reporters during a break in training at the Kennedy Space Center. "I'm just one link. I'm very hopeful that someday we see a woman leading a team landing on Mars."
Melroy will oversee the installation of a key connecting node on the station called Harmony, which will pave the way for additional science laboratories to be attached to the station beginning later this year.
Whitson will have a series of crewmates and visitors during her planned six-month mission. Only cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, who commanded a station crew in 2003, will stay aboard for the whole stint. A series of NASA and European astronauts will fill the third live-aboard slot.
In addition, Whitson's mission begins with a guest astronaut aboard, Malaysia's Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, an orthopedic physician and part-time model whose flight is part of a deal Russia cut to secure Malaysia's purchase of fighter jets.
The married 47-year-old, who already has one long-duration station mission under her belt, was given a traditional gag gift on Tuesday by her Russian hosts: a three-pronged whip "for the men to remember that you are the boss," officials said through a translator.
"I'm hoping that I will not be needing this," Whitson, speaking in Russian, said with a laugh. "But just in case ..."
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