7 Questions With Record-Setting Italian Astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti
September 21, 2021 at 12:10AM Odds are you can’t account for where you were on every one of the 200 days that elapsed from November 23, 2014 to June 11, 2015. But Samantha Cristoforetti can, since she spent them all aboard the International Space Station. Cristoforetti, Italy’s first female astronaut, set what was then a record for single-mission duration by a woman in space—and that achievement was just one in a lifetime of them. A former captain in the Italian Air Force, Cristoforetti won her fighter pilot’s wings in 2006, after earning a Master’s degree in mechanical engineering. She has been awarded the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, speaks five languages—Italian, English, German, French and Russian—and is currently studying Chinese. Sometime in the spring of 2022, she will return to space for another long-duration stay, during part of which she will serve as space station commander. She is the author of Diary of an Apprentice Astronaut , now out in paperback. ...