page_title: Peggy Whitson
section_title: Expedition 5
hierarchical_section_title: Peggy Whitson / Spaceflight experience / Expedition 5
caption_attribution_description: English: Astronaut Peggy A. Whitson, Expedition Five flight engineer, wears a Russian Orlan spacesuit as she prepares for an upcoming session of extravehicular activity (EVA) from the Pirs docking compartment on the International Space Station (ISS). The spacewalk is scheduled for August 16, 2002, which will be the 42nd spacewalk at the station and the 17th based out of the station. Whitson and cosmonaut Valery G. Korzun, mission commander, will install six debris panels on the Zvezda Service Module. The panels are designed to shield Zvezda from potential space debris impacts.
context_page_description: Peggy Annette Whitson is an American biochemistry researcher, retired NASA astronaut, and former NASA Chief Astronaut. Her first space mission was in 2002, with an extended stay aboard the International Space Station as a member of Expedition 5. Her second mission launched October 10, 2007, as the first female commander of the ISS with Expedition 16. She was on her third long-duration space flight and was the commander of the International Space Station for Expedition 51, before handing over command to Fyodor Yurchikhin on June 1, 2017.
  The flight of Space Shuttle mission STS-120, commanded by astronaut Pam Melroy, was the first time that two female mission commanders have been in orbit at the same time. After completion of her eighth EVA in March 2017, Whitson now holds the records for the oldest woman spacewalker, and the record for total spacewalks by a woman, which was broken by her again after a ninth and tenth EVA in May 2017, surpassing Sunita Williams, who has completed 7. Whitson's cumulative EVA time is 60 hours, 21 minutes, which places her in 4th place for total EVA time. She is also the oldest female astronaut ever in space, at age 57.
context_section_description: The Expedition 5 crew launched on June 5, 2002, aboard STS-111 and docked with the International Space Station on June 7, 2002. During her six-month stay aboard the Space Station, Whitson installed the Mobile Base System, the S1 truss segment, and the P1 truss segment using the space station remote manipulator system; performed a 4-hour and 25 minute spacewalk in a Russian Orlan space suit to install micrometeoroid shielding on the Zvezda Service Module; and activated and checked out the Microgravity Sciences Glovebox, a facility class payload rack.
  Whitson was named the first NASA science officer during her stay, and she conducted 21 investigations in human life sciences and microgravity sciences, as well as commercial payloads. The Expedition 5 crew returned to Earth aboard STS-113 on December 7, 2002. Completing her first flight, Whitson logged 184 days, 22 hours and 14 minutes in space.
caption: Peggy Whitson in the course of preparing for spacewalk from ISS during Expedition 5
exif: {}