What do astronauts do for NASA in between missions?
Between mission assignments, astronauts are assigned to a variety of technical duties. Some of these are CAPCOM (the people who talk to the astronauts while they’re in space), Astronaut Support Personnel (who help the astronauts who are about to go into space, and even do things like strap them in on launch day), serve on the safety support group, the science support group (who help scientists design experiments to be flown in space so that they are easy for the crew to operate), etc. So there are many interesting jobs for astronauts even when they are not training for a flight. Return to top.
