Sirisha Bandla, an Indian-born astronaut woman accompanied Richard Branson in a space travel

Sirisha Bandla was among five astronauts, including a billionaire Richard Branson, who were set to fly on Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity to the edge of the Earth’s atmosphere on July, 11. Sirisha Bandla is vice president of government affairs and research operations for Virgin Galactic. After the announcement that Sirisha was flying, her grandfather, Dr. Ragalah, a retired scientist, commented he was “overwhelmed with joy”. He told that Sirisha had always been interested in the sky and space and how to enter it.

The flight started from New Mexico and it is the fourth crewed test flight by Virgin Galactic to the edge of the atmosphere and the 22nd flight test for VSS Unity.

A 34-year-old Sirisha is an Indian-born American, who grew up in Houston, Texas and graduated from Purdue University, and is an aeronautical engineer. Sirisha Bandla has also got a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Georgetown University. She has worked for Virgin Galactic since 2015. Following Kalpana Chawla, she is the second Indian-born American woman to fly into space.

In her recent tweet, Sirisha Bandla tells it is an honor for her to join this team of astronauts and to be a part of Virgin Galactic as it makes space available for people.

A former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister NN Chandrababu Naidu tweets that Indian women go on breaking the glass ceiling, and that the flight marks the dawn of the new space age.

It is worth noting that Blue Origin’s first launch was set for July 20. Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos went to space together with his brother, the winner of the charity auction, and 82-year-old Wally Fank who had waited for 60 years for the flight. She is one of 13 women who accomplished NASA’s astronauts’ training program about 60 years ago and is going to become the oldest person traveling to space.