Kalpana Chawla: First Indian-Born Woman in Space

Kalpana Chawla was born in Karnal, India. She trained as an aerospace engineer and became a NASA astronaut.

What did she study?

• She earned a bachelor’s degree in aeronautical engineering from Punjab Engineering College in 1982.
• She earned a master’s degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas in 1984.
• She earned a doctorate in aerospace engineering from the University of Colorado in 1988.
• She became a United States citizen in 1991.

What is the memory hook?

Think “82, 84, 88”. Bachelor’s, master’s, doctorate, in that order.

She worked on air-flow research first. NASA picked her for its astronaut corps in December 1994.

What did she do before NASA?

• In 1988 she started work at NASA Ames Research Center.
• Her research there was on powered-lift computational fluid dynamics.
• In 1993 she joined Overset Methods Inc. as Vice President and Research Scientist.

How did NASA choose her?

• NASA announced its 15th group of astronauts on 8 December 1994.
• Chawla was in that group.
• She reported to the Johnson Space Center in March 1995.
• In November 1996 she was assigned to STS-87 as a mission specialist and prime robotic arm operator.

What is the memory hook?

Think “pick in 1994, post in 1996”. NASA chose her first and gave her a flight two years later.

STS-87 was her first flight. Columbia launched on 19 November 1997 and landed on 5 December 1997.

What was the mission about?

• STS-87 was the fourth US Microgravity Payload flight.
• It studied how weightlessness affects physical processes.
• It also observed the outer layers of the Sun’s atmosphere.
• Chawla ran the robotic arm as the prime operator.
• Two crew members made a spacewalk to capture a Spartan satellite by hand.
• The flight made 252 orbits of Earth in 376 hours and 34 minutes.

What is the memory hook?

Think “87 in 1997”. The mission number and the year end in the same digits.

STS-107 was her second and last flight. Columbia broke up on 1 February 2003 as it came back to Earth.

What was the mission?

• STS-107 ran from 16 January to 1 February 2003.
• It was a 16-day science and research mission.
• The crew worked in two shifts around the clock.
• They carried out about 80 experiments.
• Chawla was Flight Engineer and Mission Specialist 2.
• All seven crew members were lost.

What went wrong?

• Foam fell from the External Tank during launch.
• It struck the Reinforced Carbon Carbon panels under the left wing.
• That damage led to the loss of the orbiter during re-entry.

How much time did she spend in space?

She logged 30 days, 14 hours and 54 minutes in space over her two flights.

What is the memory hook?

Think “launch damage, re-entry loss”. The harm came on the way up. The loss came on the way down.

NASA, India and a Karnataka body all honoured her after her death. One honour came within days.

What honours did she receive?

• She was posthumously awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
• She also received the NASA Space Flight Medal and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal.
• On 5 February 2003, Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee renamed the satellite MetSat-1 as Kalpana-1.
• MetSat-1 had been launched on 12 September 2002 by a PSLV.
• The Government of Karnataka set up the Kalpana Chawla Award in 2003.
• The award goes to women scientists and engineers in Karnataka.

What is the memory hook?

Think “Metsat becomes Kalpana”. A weather satellite carries her name.

She was the first Indian-born woman to fly in space. She was not the first Indian in space.

What does NASA call her?

• NASA calls her the first Indian-born NASA astronaut.
• The Smithsonian calls her the first Indian woman to fly in space.
• Rakesh Sharma had flown in 1984 as an Indian citizen.
• Shubhanshu Shukla flew on Axiom-4 in June 2025.

What is the memory hook?

Think “born in India, flew for the US”. Sharma was the Indian citizen who flew first.

Four mix-ups appear often. Learn each pair.

What are the traps?

• STS-87 or STS-107? STS-87 was her first flight in 1997. STS-107 was her last flight in 2003.
• MetSat-1 or Kalpana-1? They are the same satellite, renamed on 5 February 2003.
• First Indian or first Indian-born woman? Rakesh Sharma flew first, in 1984.
• Order of flights: Sharma flew in 1984, Chawla in 1997, Williams in 2006 and Bandla in 2021.

How has this been asked before?

The trap is the order of the later three. Chawla is second, after Sharma.

How do you remember the order?

Think “84, 97, 06, 21”. Sharma, Chawla, Williams, Bandla.