Fairview High School Grad Jessica Watkins Will Become First Black Woman On International Space Station Crew

(CBS4) - The first Black woman who will live and work on the International Space Station is from Colorado. Jessica Watkins has been assigned to the upcoming SpaceX Crew-4 mission to the space station, NASA announced this week.

Watkins went to Fairview High School in Boulder and claims Lafayette as her hometown. This will be her first trip to space. Watkins will serve as mission specialist when the crew launches in April for a 6 month science mission aboard the microgravity laboratory.

NASA selected Watkins as an astronaut in 2017.

Last year at Johnson Space Center in Houston she participated in the graduation ceremony for NASA's astronaut training program.

Two other NASA astronauts will be Crew-4 mission members -- Kjell Lindgren and Robert Hines -- and a European Space Agency astronaut will also be on the crew.

Humans "have lived and worked continuously aboard the International Space Station in low-Earth Orbit, advancing scientific knowledge, demonstrating new technologies, and making research breakthroughs not possible on Earth" for 21 years, according to NASA.