NASA has just announced 12 new astronaut candidates. Three of them have some sort of ties to Colorado.

These 12 new recruits will undergo more than two years of schooling and space training to prepare them for actual space missions. According to NASA, these could be anything from the Space Launch System rocket to the International Space Station.

Let's meet the three new candidates that have a Colorado connection:

  • Navy Lt. Commander Matthew Dominick is from Wheat Ridge, Colo. He has been through Navy test pilot school and is a member of the Navy strike fighter squadron 115. He also holds a Master's in Systems Engineering.
  • Jessica Watkins hails from Lafayette, Colo. She holds a Ph.D. in Geology and a post-doctoral fellow at California Institute of Technology.
  • U.S. Army Major Fransico Rubio is originally from Florida but now lives in Colorado Springs. He has a Doctorate of Medicine and is a surgeon with the 3rd Battalion, 10th Special Forces Group.

We wish all 12 of these new astronaut candidates the best of luck in their pursuit to go where few have ever gone.

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