{"id":881646,"date":"2026-10-14T05:28:13","date_gmt":"2026-10-14T05:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/881646\/"},"modified":"2026-10-14T05:28:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-14T05:28:13","slug":"christina-koch-retiring-from-flight-status","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/881646\/","title":{"rendered":"Christina Koch Retiring From Flight Status"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tChristina Koch in January 2026, at Kennedy Space Center. Photo: Charles Boyer<\/p>\n

Christina Koch, who flew Orion around the Moon after launching from Kennedy Space Center in April, is trading her flight status for a leadership post at NASA headquarters. The agency announced she will become acting deputy chief engineer on November 1st. <\/p>\n


\n
\n \n <\/p>\n

Koch succeeds Katherine Van Hooser, who retires Oct. 21 after more than 35 years with NASA. The move makes Koch a management astronaut, which means she will not be assigned to future spaceflights. With that transition, all four astronauts who flew on Artemis II are now retired from flight status.<\/p>\n

As an astronaut, Koch has spent roughly 337 days and 15.5 hours in space. She currently holds the record (with her Artemis II crewmates) for distance traveled away from Earth, and as part of that record, she is the highest-flying woman in history. She spent 328 days, 13 hours, and 58 minutes aboard the ISS, which at the time set a spaceflight duration record for women, and has traveled about 140 million miles in space during her flight career.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\tArtemis II launching in April 2026, with Christina Koch aboard. P
hoto: Charles Boyer<\/p>\n

New Job, New Challenges<\/p>\n

As deputy chief engineer, Koch will help direct the agency\u2019s engineering workforce. The job covers technical oversight and mission readiness across NASA\u2019s programs and projects.<\/p>\n

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman pointed to Koch\u2019s experience on both ends of the hardware. He said she has helped build complex systems on the ground and then relied on them to stay alive in space. Isaacman tied the appointment to the agency\u2019s near-term agenda, including landing astronauts back on the lunar surface, building a Moon base, advancing nuclear power in space and preparing for Mars.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Big Shoes To Fill<\/p>\n

Amit Kshatriya, NASA\u2019s associate administrator and chief engineer, credited Van Hooser with steering the agency\u2019s engineering community through critical milestones and transitions. He said he was \u201cconfident Christina will continue the tradition of technical excellence\u201d at NASA.<\/p>\n

Koch\u2019s appointment comes six months after Artemis II, the first crewed flight around the Moon in more than half a century. She flew as a mission specialist on the flight, which drew crowds across the Space Coast for its April launch.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\u201cEarthset\u201d \u2014 photographed by Christina Koch aboard Artemis II in April 2026.
Photo: NASA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Christina Koch in January 2026, at Kennedy Space Center. Photo: Charles Boyer Christina Koch, who flew Orion around…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":881647,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[83398,42141,71987,196513,944,71447,3631,83692,4174,370238,16569,101147,718,227439,370239,370240,370241,79,33403,34076,349527],"class_list":["post-881646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-amit-kshatriya","tag-artemis-ii","tag-artemis-program","tag-christina-koch","tag-goddard-space-flight-center","tag-human-spaceflight","tag-international-space-station","tag-jared-isaacman","tag-johnson-space-center","tag-katherine-van-hooser","tag-kennedy-space-center","tag-moon-mission","tag-nasa","tag-nasa-astronaut","tag-nasa-deputy-chief-engineer","tag-nasa-engineering","tag-nasa-leadership","tag-science","tag-space-coast","tag-titusville","tag-women-in-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=881646"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/881646\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/881647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=881646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=881646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=881646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}