Katherine Bennell-Pegg, Australian Space Agency Director, will make history as the first Australian woman to be trained as an astronaut by an international space agency.
Based in Adelaide, Bennell-Pegg will travel to Germany next month for training hopes to inspire more young people and particularly young women to show it can be done.
“While I’m named as the first to represent Australia, I hope I won’t be the last,” she told the ABC.
There’ve been previous Australian astronauts who’ve flown as citizens of other nations, but Bennell-Pegg will be the first female to train under the Australian flag.
“It’s been a privilege to play a part in shaping our growing space sector in Australia in recent years and I now look forward to contributing even more through this historic opportunity,” she said in an official statement.
As a child growing up on the northern beaches of Sydney and fascinated with space, Bennell-Pegg didn’t get to see Australian female representation in the space industry.
Now she has become a role model for the next generation of female astronauts.
With more than 12 years of experience as a space systems engineer, Bennell-Pegg has already studied and worked across 6 countries in exciting projects such as human spaceflight missions and technologies, the International Space Station, debris removal concepts, scientific earth observation and space exploration missions.
“I have always dreamed of being an astronaut. When I was young, it was for the adventure but after more than a decade working in space it’s now because I know the role it plays in tackling real-world problems and developing new knowledge that can benefit our society, environment and science,” Bennell-Pegg said.
Her determination will see her receive astronaut training through the European Space Agency, which will run from April until mid-2024. The training will provide Bennell-Pegg with a basic training certification, a requirement to be selected for a space mission.
Wanting to use this experience to “show all Australians that they too can reach for the stars,” as she puts it, Bennell-Pegg hopes to see more young women entering the space industry and notes that “less than 27 per cent of the Australian STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) workforce are women”.
“Women are very much the minority globally,” said Bennell-Pegg.
“Without diversity in our STEM workforce in all its forms, we can’t have the creativity we need to solve the problems of the future.”