Eileen Collins: podcast appearances and interviews

Eileen Marie Collins, born on November 19, 1956, is a retired NASA astronaut and United States Air Force colonel. She is recognized for being the first woman to pilot and to command a United States Space Shuttle mission. Collins graduated from Corning Community College with an associate degree in mathematics in 1976 and from Syracuse University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics and economics in 1978. She was commissioned as an officer in the USAF through the university's Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps program and was one of four women selected for Undergraduate Pilot Training at Vance Air Force Base. After earning her pilot wings, she served as a T-38 Talon instructor pilot and later flew the C-141 Starlifter. During her military career, Collins participated in missions such as transporting troops during the invasion of Grenada in 1983 and served as an assistant professor in mathematics at the U.S. Air Force Academy. She earned advanced degrees from Stanford University and Webster University, including a Master of Science in operations research and a Master of Arts in space systems management. Collins was selected as a NASA pilot astronaut in 1990 and flew aboard the Space Shuttle in missions including STS-63, which involved a rendezvous with the Russian space station Mir, and STS-84. She became the first woman to command a US spacecraft with the STS-93 mission in 1999. In 2005, she commanded the STS-114 mission, which marked NASA's return to flight following the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, and she performed the first complete 360-degree pitch maneuver of a Space Shuttle orbiter. Collins retired from the USAF in 2005 and from NASA in 2006.