Meet NASA Astronaut & Artemis Team Member Anne McClain [Video]

Anne McClain. Credit: NASA

NASA astronaut Anne McClain is a member of the Artemis Team, a select group of astronauts charged with focusing on the development and training efforts for early Artemis missions.

Anne C. McClain was selected by NASA in 2013. The Spokane, Washington native earned a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical/Aeronautical Engineering from West Point. A 2002 Marshall Scholar, McClain earned a Master of Science in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Bath in Bath, England and a Master of Science in International Relations from the University of Bristol in Bristol, England. Lieutenant Colonel McClain, a Senior Army Aviator, has more than 2,000 flight hours in 20 different aircraft. She is an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior pilot and instructor pilot, and a rated pilot in the C-12 Huron (King Air), UH-60 Blackhawk, and UH-72 Lakota. McCLain most recently served as Flight Engineer on the International Space Station for Expedition 58 and 59.

McClain was commissioned as an Army officer in 2002 and immediately attended graduate school. Her studies at the University of Bath focused on the unsteady aerodynamics and flow visualization of free-to-roll nonslender delta wings and her research was later published through the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). She concurrently researched the security burden in developing countries at nearby University of Bristol.

Following graduate school, McClain earned her wings as an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior scout/attack helicopter pilot. She began her operational flying career with 2nd Battalion, 6th Cavalry Regiment at Wheeler Army Airfield, Hawaii as an Air Traffic Control Platoon Leader, Aviation Intermediate Maintenance Platoon Leader, then later Detachment Commander. She served 15 months in Operation Iraqi Freedom, flying more than 800 combat hours on 216 combat missions as pilot-in-command and Air Mission Commander.

In 2009, she attended the Aviation Captain’s Career Course and was then assigned to 1st Battalion, 14th Aviation Regiment at Fort Rucker as the battalion operations officer and OH-58D instructor. In May 2010, she was appointed Commander of C Troop, 1st Battalion, 14th Aviation Regiment, responsible for the Army’s initial entry training, instructor pilot training, and maintenance test pilot training in the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior. She completed Command and General Staff College and the C-12 fixed wing multiengine qualification courses in 2011 and 2012. She then attended the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School, graduating with Class 143 in June 2013 at the same time she was selected as a NASA astronaut candidate.

Major McClain is a Senior Army Aviator and has logged more than 2,000 flight hours in 20 different rotary and fixed-wing aircraft. She is a rated pilot and instructor pilot in the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior and a rated pilot in the C-12 Huron (King Air), UH-60 Blackhawk, and UH-72 Lakota.

McClain was selected in June 2013 as one of eight members of the 21st NASA astronaut class. Her Astronaut Candidate Training included scientific and technical briefings, intensive instruction in International Space Station systems, spacewalks, robotics, physiological training, T-38 flight training, and water and wilderness survival training. She completed astronaut candidate training in July 2015, and is now qualified for future assignment.

Anne McLain most recently served as Flight Engineer on the International Space Station for Expedition 58 and 59.

Through the Artemis program NASA and a coalition of international partners will return to the Moon to learn how to live on other worlds for the benefit of all. With Artemis missions NASA will send the first woman and the next man to the Moon in 2024 and about once per year thereafter.

Through the efforts of humans and robots, we will explore more of the Moon than ever before; to lead a journey of discovery that benefits our planet with life changing science, to use the Moon and its resources as a technology testbed to go even farther and to learn how to establish and sustain a human presence far beyond Earth.