Sunita Williams born September 19, 1965, Euclid, Ohio, U.S is an American astronaut who set records on her two flights to the International Space Station (ISS).
In 1983 Williams entered the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland
She was made an ensign in 1987 and reported for aviator training at the Naval Aviation Training Command.
In July 1989 she began combat helicopter training.
She flew in helicopter support squadrons during the preparations for the Persian Gulf War and the establishment of no-fly zones over Kurdish areas of Iraq, as well as in relief missions during Hurricane Andrew in 1992 in Miami.
On December 9, 2006, Williams flew aboard the space shuttle Discovery on the STS-116 mission to the ISS, where she was a flight engineer for Expeditions 14 and 15.
Williams flew to the ISS again on July 15, 2012, as part of the crew of Soyuz TMA-05M. She was a flight engineer on Expedition 32, and on September 16 she became commander of Expedition 33.
In 2015 Williams was selected as one of four astronauts to make the first test flights in NASA’s Commercial Crew program, in which two new private crewed spacecraft, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner, would take astronauts and supplies to the ISS.
She was chosen in 2022 for the first crewed test Starliner flight to the ISS, which is scheduled for May 2024.