AVONDALE – Estrella Mountain Community College celebrated Women’s History Month by hosting an event on March 27. Marine Col. Nicole Mann, a member of the Wailacki tribe of the Round Valley Indian Tribes, was invited to speak at the event. She shared her unorthodox journey to becoming an astronaut.
Mann is the first female Indigenous astronaut and only the second Indigenous person to go to space.
Early on as a child, Mann said she knew she wanted to serve in the military but wasn’t sure which path to take.
“The idea of being an astronaut hadn’t even entered my mind at this point. I mean I had never met an astronaut before. I didn’t know exactly what they did. It seemed like something that other people did from somewhere else, right? But, it’s not something for me,” Mann said at the community college event.
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At the U.S. Naval Academy, she …