Anil Menon, the Indian-origin doctor selected by Nasa to become astronaut

NASA on Monday announced that it has chosen 10 new astronaut candidates who will represent the United States and work for its future missions. The space agency said in a statement on Monday that the candidates were chosen from over 12,000 applicants from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and US territories Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands, and the Northern Mariana Islands.

“Today we welcome 10 new explorers, 10 members of the Artemis generation, NASA’s 2021 astronaut candidate class. Alone, each candidate has ‘the right stuff,’ but together they represent the creed of our country: E pluribus unum – out of many, one,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said while introducing the members of the 2021 astronaut class during an event at Ellington Field near NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

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Among the chosen ones is Anil Menon, an Indian-origin doctor and a lieutenant colonel at the US Air Force. 

Who is Anil Menon? 

Born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the 45-year-old  graduated in engineering and medicine at Stanford Medical School. He worked at NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, California. 

Son of an Indian immigrant, Menon is also an emergency medicine physician and was the first responder as a physician after the Haiti earthquake in 2010 and the Nepal earthquake in 2015. He has served in the US Air Force as a flight surgeon for the 45th Space Wing and the 173rd Fighter Wing. As part of the critical care air transport team, he flew more than 100 sorties in the F-15 fighter jet and transported hundreds of patients.

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Menon is married to Anna Menon, who is a SpaceX employee, and they have two have children. He assisted in the launch of Elon Musk’s SpaceX’s first humans to space.