Four American space pioneers have been selected to be the first astronauts to train to fly to space on commercial crew vehicles, all part of NASA's ambitious plan to return space launches to U.S. soil, open up low Earth orbit transportation to the private sector, and advance the goal of sending humans farther into the solar system than ever before. 

Eric Boe, who earned a Master of Science in electrical engineering from Georgia Tech in 1997, was one of the four selected. Boe, a U.S. Air Force colonel, was born in Miami and grew up in Atlanta. As an Air Force pilot, he flew more than 5,000 hours in more than 45 different aircraft before NASA selected him as an astronaut in July 2000. A veteran of two spaceflights, STS-126 in November 2008 and STS-133 in February of 2011, Boe has spent more than 28 days in space.

Boe and the three other commercial crew astronauts will work closely with company led teams to understand their designs and operations as they finalize their Boeing CST-100 and SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft and operational strategies in support of their crewed flight tests and certification activities as part of their contracts with NASA.

The selection of astronauts for rides with NASA’s Commercial Crew Program (CCP) comes almost exactly four years to the day since the last American manned space launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis on the STS-135 mission to the space station on July 8, 2011 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Both the CST-100 and Crew Dragon will typically carry a crew of four NASA or NASA-sponsored crew members, along with some 220 pounds of pressurized cargo. Each will also be capable of carrying up to seven crew members depending on how the capsule is configured.The spacecraft will be capable to remaining docked at the station for up to 210 days and serve as an emergency lifeboat during that time.