by The first Hispanic woman to be launched into space is the second female astronaut to be awarded the United States’ highest honor.
Ellen Ochoa, who later commanded NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom during a ceremony at the White House on Friday (May 3). Ochoa is the 10th astronaut to receive the medal.
“For most, the American dream is to be successful in whatever endeavor you choose here on Earth. For Dr. Ellen Ochoa, her dream was in heaven,” said President Joe Biden, who presided over the ceremony. “Ellen was the first Hispanic woman to go to space, ushering in a whole new age of space exploration and what it means for every generation to reach for the stars.”
Individuals selected for the Presidential Medal of Freedom have made significant contributions to the prosperity, values or security of the United States, to world peace or to other societal, public or private endeavors, according to the White House.
“Wow, what a wonderful and unexpected honor!” said Ochoa, after hearing for the first time that she was going to be honored, according to a statement released by NASA. “I am so grateful to my wonderful NASA colleagues who have shared my career journey with me.”
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Ochoa was working as a research engineer at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California when she was selected to join the agency’s 13th group of astronauts in 1990. She flew on four space shuttle missions between 1993 and 2002, logging more than 40 a day in Earth’s orbit.
During Ochoa’s first flight, STS-56, she used the space shuttle’s robotic arm to deploy and retrieve a satellite that looked at the sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona. The mission was aimed at gathering data about the relationship between the sun’s energy output and the Earth’s atmosphere and how those factors affected the planet’s ozone layer.
On her next three missions, STS-66, STS-96 and STS-110, Ochoa continued to help study the Earth’s atmosphere; she was among the first astronauts to enter the International Space Station; and later helped install a section of the station’s backbone truss.
Ochoa was the 18th US woman to be launched into space and the 22nd in the world. She was the 295th person to leave the Earth’s atmosphere and the 288th person to enter orbit, as recorded in the Space Traveler Registry of the Association of Space Explorers.
In 2013, Ochoa was named the 11th director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, home to mission control and the US astronaut corps. Only the second woman to hold the position, Ochoa served for five years, overseeing the selection of the first crews to launch on commercial spacecraft and the first year-long mission aboard the International Space Station.
In addition to the Presidential Medal of Freedom, Ochoa has been recognized for her role in the US space program with NASA’s highest award, the Distinguished Service Medal, and in 2017 she was inducted into the US Astronaut Hall of Fame in Florida. Schools today bear her name in California, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Texas and Washington.
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Previous recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom include the first American to orbit the Earth, John Glenn; Apollo 11 moon landing crew Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins; Apollo 13 crew James Lovell, Fred Haise and Jack Swigert; and the first American woman in space, Sally Ride.
Other past NASA honorees include the Apollo 13 mission operations team (including astronaut Edgar Mitchell), “Hidden Figures” mathematician Katherine Johnson and computer programmer Margaret Hamilton, who led a team MIT software engineering that developed the guidance system for the Apollo spacecraft.
Ochoa was honored Friday along with 18 other Medal of Freedom recipients, including former Vice President Al Gore, Senators Elizabeth Dole, John Kerry and Frank Lautenberg, former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, the journalist Phil Donahue and actress Michelle Yeoh.
Biden also recognized Jane Rigby, an astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, who serves as senior project scientist for the James Webb Space Telescope.
“Through unlocking the secrets of the galaxy, Dr. Rigby would release spices of wonder deep into our souls,” Biden said.
She worked on the development of the orbiting observatory for many years and then led the characterization of Webb’s science performance after its deployment into deep space in 2022.
“Webb has become a symbol not only of technical excellence and scientific discovery, but also of what humanity can achieve when we all work together,” Rigby said in a statement. released by NASA. “I am so proud and grateful to lead the amazing team at Webb.”
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