The figures, although cold and pristine, are evident: 328 days in space, 5,000 orbits around the Earth, the first space walk carried out exclusively by women and more than 100 experiments carried out in orbit. But the truth is that The figures are cold and pristine if we talk about Christina Koch, the Princess of Asturias Award for Concord 2026.
When Koch arrived at the International Space Station in March 2019, she was no newcomer to living isolated from the rest of humanity. Before becoming an astronaut, between 2004 and 2007, he was part of the United States Antarctic Program. He spent one winter at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, where temperatures reached -79°C, and another season at Palmer Station. In Antarctica, he was part of firefighting and search and rescue teams in oceans and glaciers.
“This means spending months without seeing the sun, with the same equipment and without receiving mail or fresh food – Koch explained in an interview -. Isolation, the absence of family and friends, and the lack of new sensory experiences are conditions in which you have to find a strategy to survive.” Koch spent months observing the sky from the South Pole and years later observed Antarctica from space: Few human beings have contemplated both extremes of human exploration from the two great limits of our knowledge.
Perhaps that is why he endured a space mission that would end up becoming historic better than almost anyone. Koch spent 328 consecutive days in orbit, a record for a female astronaut and the fifth longest stay in space. During that time he circled the Earth more than 5,000 times and participated in hundreds of scientific experiments. and starred alongside Jessica Meir in the first spacewalk carried out exclusively by women.
But to understand who Christina Koch is, you have to go back long before the launch. Born in Michigan in 1979, Koch early developed a fascination with places that appeared on maps as blank spaces. As a child she filled her room with photographs of Antarctica and space taken from scientific magazines. Years later he would remember that he was attracted to all the territories that still seemed to be on the frontier of the unknown. studied simultaneously Physics and Electrical Engineering and completed a master’s degree in engineering, a rare combination even among astronauts. This allowed him to be part of the team that designed the scientific instruments for NASA’s Juno mission, the probe currently studying Jupiter.
That is, Koch has not only explored space. It has also contributed to building the tools that allow it to be explored. When its space mission was extended to almost eleven months, NASA was not just looking to break a record. The scientists wanted collect information on the effects of long-duration flights on the human organism, fundamental knowledge for future trips to Mars or the Moon. Most of the available data historically came from men, so the Koch mission provided especially valuable information.
His next milestone came with the Artemis program. Koch was selected for the Artemis II mission, the first manned mission to return to the vicinity of the Moon since the days of the Apollo program. She is the first woman to make a trip around our satellite and the first to leave Earth’s orbit to enter deep space.
But the recent award that Koch has received is not only based on his scientific career, but on his more human side. He practices rock and ice climbing, triathlon, surfing, long-distance hiking, woodworking, and photography. He has also worked in American Samoa studying the Earth’s atmosphere and He has spent more time in remote environments than most professional explorers.
When asked about space, he rarely talks about heroism. Talk about curiosity. And perhaps that is the best way to define it. Christina Koch does not seem to belong to the tradition of space conquerors, but to a much older tradition: that of those who feel an irresistible attraction to places where there are still unanswered questions. AND seek answers that unite us as a species. That’s called concordanceto.