Set to jet off into space on Virgin Galactic, Sirisha Bandla, makes country proud

Sirisha Bandla, born in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh. She grew up in Houston, Texas in the United States and graduated in aeronautical engineering from Purdue University. She also attended Georgetown University and holds a Master’s in Business Administration.

After Kalpana Chawla, Sirisha Bandla is among the five people to take the fourth fully crewed test space flight with Virgin Galactic and will become the second India-born woman to travel to space.

Virgin Galactic’s founder billionaire Richard Branson will also be on board the flight. It will launch from New Mexico on July 11th.

The space mission, announced on Friday, 2 July, comes nine days ahead of Amazon’s Jeff Bezos’ flight to space which was announced last month.

She joined Virgin Galactic in 2015 and presently holds the designation of vice president of government affairs at the company.

In her reaction to having a chance to jet off into space, Bandla tweeted: ” “I am so incredibly honored to be a part of the amazing crew of #Unity22, and to be a part of a company whose mission is to make space available to all.”