The contribution of women to the development of the space industry

In 1959-60, thirteen women, later known as the “Mercury 13,” underwent the same physiological screening tests for astronauts as their male counterparts. But they were never allowed to fly: only one member of the team ever made it to space, and only in 2021 aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard 4. Despite these women’s achievements, NASA barred them from spaceflight for years and limited their opportunities to hold key positions within the agency. Today, in the mid-2020s, women in the space industry are no longer exceptions to the rule, but achieving this required tremendous effort, and the work continues.  

In the first month of spring, a time traditionally marked by discussions on equality and women’s rights, we will explore how gender stereotypes in the space sector continue to be dismantled.

The contribution of women to space exploration prior to the first orbital flight

The “female” side of space exploration history began long before Valentina Tereshkova’s first flight in 1963 and even before the formation of the Mercury 13 team. In 1786, Caroline Herschel became the first woman to discover a comet. During 40 years of scientific work starting in 1896, Annie Cannon classified more than 350,000 stars. Without Henrietta Swan Leavitt, the astrophysicist Edwin Hubble might never have made a key discovery: confirming the existence of galaxies beyond the Milky Way (1924–1926).  

But until the mid-20th century, the very idea of women engaging in science was considered extraordinary. By default, they were expected to manage household affairs, and their intellectual abilities were often questioned. Those few who managed to defy stereotypes, obtain a technical education, and work in their field only achieved this through immense effort—and sometimes sheer luck. Margaret Burbidge earned a doctorate from the University of London, but when she was denied access to the Mount Wilson Observatory telescope, she had to pose as her husband’s assistant. Nancy Grace Roman, the first woman in a leadership role at NASA and the “mother” of the Hubble Space Telescope, was repeatedly discouraged from pursuing astronomy by her peers. Early in her career, she was forced to resign from a university assistant professorship, as she had no prospects for advancing to a research-related role.

How space became accessible to women

The women of Mercury 13, named in reference to the Mercury 7 astronaut team, never received clearance for official training. At one intermediate stage, their Phase II testing was simply canceled, denying them the opportunity to undergo isolation tank trials and psychological evaluations. The “Women in Space” program, which originally selected 19 candidates, was never intended to grant women equal rights with men. While the women’s rights movement was gaining momentum, forcing NASA to respond, the Soviet Union, the United States’ main competitor in the space race, had already begun preparing women for spaceflight.  

NASA faced criticism over the Mercury 13 incident, but even outraged articles in magazines like LIFE could not change the situation. Hearings in the House of Representatives on gender discrimination in 1962 also led nowhere. At the time, John Glenn and two of his colleagues argued that, under NASA’s rules, the women in question could not become astronauts because they lacked two key qualifications: an engineering degree and experience as military jet test pilots. Ironically, Glenn himself met only one of these criteria (the second) when he flew.  

A year later, Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space. Pilot Jerrie Cobb, the leading participant in the Mercury 13 program, called the event a “shame” in a New York Times interview, saying that the United States had “failed to do it first.”

In the United States, women in the space industry began to be taken more seriously only in the mid-1970s. In 1972, an amendment to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed, finally providing women with legal support to enter the space sector. In 1978, the requirement for astronaut candidates to have jet fighter pilot experience was removed. However, despite NASA’s increased practice of hiring women, they were mostly given low-paying positions that did not involve participation in space missions.  

It wasn’t until 1983 that Sally Kristen Ride became the first American woman, and the third woman in the world (the second was the Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya, who flew a year earlier), to travel to space. The 44th U.S. President, Barack Obama, called her a “national hero” who “inspired generations of young girls to reach for the stars.” Ride indeed made significant contributions to education and the promotion of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). After her NASA career, in the early 2000s, she co-founded Sally Ride Science, an organization dedicated to advancing STEM education among girls and women.

Not just flights

Since 1961, more than 600 astronauts have traveled to space. However, fewer than 100 women have completed even a single orbital flight. All of the astronauts who have visited the Moon have been men. Meanwhile, thousands of women who made the Moon landing possible and worked alongside men remained behind the scenes for years: mathematicians and engineers, personal assistants, and seamstresses.  

Jayme Flowers Coplin served as the personal secretary to astronaut Gordon Cooper and other members of space missions. Margaret Hamilton developed the onboard software for NASA’s lunar program—the system that helped prevent the Apollo 11 landing from failing. Mathematician Katherine Johnson and other women performed complex astrodynamics calculations, earning her the nickname “the human computer.” Although she was professionally active from the 1950s to the 1980s, Johnson’s achievements were only fully recognized in the 2000s. Her true fame came after the publication and later the film adaptation of Hidden Figures, which highlighted the contributions of Black women working at NASA.

The examples of Hamilton and Johnson continue to inspire women to build careers in the space industry, but gender equity in high-tech fields is still a long way off. Although NASA has been hiring women for computing-related positions since 1935, by the early 2020s, women made up just 28.8% of specialists working in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics research worldwide. In leadership positions within the aerospace industry, this percentage is even lower: only 19%.  

Historically, women have been, and continue to be, more readily hired for roles not directly related to the hard sciences, but these contributions to space industry development should not be underestimated. Many have heard of the seamstresses, pattern makers, and suit assemblers of the ILC Dover team who designed Apollo astronauts’ spacesuits. One of them, Iona Allen, made space exploration history by designing and crafting the boots for Neil Armstrong’s first steps on the Moon.

The systematic denial of women’s contributions to science and the downplaying of their work by men has been termed the “Matilda Effect” by science historian Margaret W. Rossiter. Among its causes, Rossiter points to hierarchical segregation, which forces women to put in extra effort to prove they can handle complex tasks in professions traditionally dominated by men. At the same time, women tend to self-censor and often underestimate their own abilities, which leads to a vicious cycle. Breaking out of this cycle is hindered by the still-rare examples of women scientists and natural science educators.  

Nevertheless, compared to the mid-20th century, the situation has improved: space has become more accessible to women, and the numbers confirm this. Much of this progress is due to women persistently pursuing their goals and various initiatives encouraging girls and women to engage in science and pursue education in STEM fields.

Space4Women and other projects

Former NASA astronaut and engineer Sandra Magnus is one of the few women to spend over 100 days in space—150 to be exact. She served as the executive director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the world’s largest aerospace technical society, and in 2009 received NASA’s highest honor, the “Outstanding Leadership Medal.” In 2019, Christina Koch and Jessica Meir became the first all-female team to conduct a spacewalk. These women’s stories continue to inspire and break gender barriers in the space industry.

To open access to science and technology for girls and women, the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs launched the Space4Women project. According to the UN, achieving the 17 Sustainable Development Goals requires creating conditions where girls and women can make informed choices and actively participate in the space sector on equal terms with men. Space4Women’s activities aim to encourage women to pursue education in STEM fields and raise their awareness of professional growth opportunities, the importance of gender equality, and career prospects in the space industry.

Space4Women is actively developing its mentoring program, selecting mentors from among leaders in the space sector for girls and women who wish to or are already pursuing education in STEM. Regular  Space4Women expert meetings are held across the world, especially in countries where girls often still have limited access to education. One of the most recent meetings took place in November 2024 at the UN headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya. Space4Women also collaborates with the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), which promotes the “Space for Women” initiative in its country.

In 2024, the British Council launched the Women in Space Leadership Programme (WiSLP) as part of the UK-India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI). Today, at Coventry University in the UK, various activities are being held to create a gender-inclusive environment in space sciences. The program currently involves 250 young female researchers.

Alongside Space4Women and WiSLP, there are other, smaller, yet equally important, initiatives and projects. For example, Space4Girls develops interactive extracurricular programs for high school students, teachers, and young American women who wish to learn more about space exploration through STEM. Participants in this program launch real weather balloons, acquire basic knowledge of “astropreneurship,” and use specialized platforms to study the impact of space on biological processes in plants. Additionally, at Purdue University (Indiana, USA), there is the Leading Women Toward Space Careers program, which, like Space4Women, is based on a mentoring system. In addition to working with mentors, program participants attend thematic seminars, visit NASA facilities, and observe astronomical phenomena.

What problems remain to be solved?

Since the mid-20th century, women’s participation in space projects was viewed merely as part of a mandatory program: “the first woman to fly into space,” “the first woman to perform a spacewalk,” “the first mother in space,” etc. Such stories were not so much about equal rights as being part of the social agenda. While one part of society demands more rights and career opportunities for women, another accepts minimal concessions, treating each instance of women’s involvement in space missions into an extraordinary achievement.

However, alongside this, there are more pragmatic reasons to involve more women in the space sector, particularly in spaceflight. There is a possibility that the crew of a future Mars mission could consist exclusively of women. According to the European Space Agency’s (ESA) space medicine team, a typical female astronaut consumes 26% fewer calories, 29% less oxygen, and 18% less water than a male astronaut. Considering that a Mars mission could last several hundred days, potential resource savings would be significant.

At the same time, gender stereotypes in the space industry still have a strong influence on the formation of personnel policies, and the proportion of women who have succeeded in natural sciences is still growing rather slowly. As noted by Space4Women, this is in part because women still do not receive enough information about STEM, nor access to education in space technologies and careers in the aerospace industry. Gender inequality is further complicated by the significant pay gap, which also exists in the space industry.

According to UNICEF, STEM education remains inaccessible to a large number of girls around the world, 125 million of whom live in developing countries. This is often the result of societal pressure that insists on early marriage and domestic duties for women. As a result, by the age of 13-14, a clear gap is already visible between the number of girls and boys desiring or able to pursue education in natural sciences. Although women typically complete STEM programs faster than men, they are less likely to secure jobs in their fields due to gender biases and discrimination.

Women who participate in space launches also encounter sexism and objectification. A video by engineer and TV host Emily Calandrelli, who went to space in 2024, garnered hundreds of offensive comments. Emily traveled to space as a tourist as part of a tour organized by Blue Origin and recorded a video sharing her reaction to Earth from space. The company was forced to remove the video from their social media accounts due to the hate directed at Calandrelli, including comments that sexualized her. Despite the social media backlash, Calandrelli told CNN that she gained a unique experience and that the beauty of sending more women into space lies in the fact that they “get to describe it in a way that moms can understand, that women can understand.”

The lack of privacy, cramped living quarters, and the inability to maintain close contact with relatives negatively affect the mental and emotional well-being of both men and women. However, some physical aspects of spaceflights still cause discomfort specifically for women. For several decades, women’s needs were not considered when designing space toilets. This changed in 2020 when upgraded toilets for both men and women were delivered to the International Space Station (ISS). Spacesuits designed with female anatomy in mind have already been developed for Artemis III and it is expected that this mission will mark the first time a woman lands on the Moon. The prototype spacesuit, which is meant to be equally comfortable for both women and men, was created by Axiom Space in collaboration with the fashion house Prada.

The proportion of women in the space industry is gradually increasing. Women are performing complex calculations, leading missions, and conducting spacewalks, but they remain underrepresented in key positions. Despite this, the process of breaking down gender stereotypes in the space industry has long been underway and is irreversible, thanks to the persistent and talented women who have challenged society, the promotion of STEM, mentorship programs in educational institutions, and the work of inspiring role models. With the help of these factors, as well as broadening societal support, space may one day become a truly gender-neutral environment where anyone, regardless of gender, can realize their potential.