Sanjal Gavande is a Maharashtra’s Kalyan born 30-year-old woman. She is among the team of engineers who built Blue Origin’s suborbital space rocket New Shephard that will take billionaire Jeff Bezos and three others to space later this month.
About Sanjal Gavande
Sanjal Gavande is a system engineer at the commercial spaceflight company. She is a mechanical engineering graduate from the University of Mumbai. She flew to the US in 2011 to pursue her master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Michigan Technological University.
System Engineer-Sanjal Gavande | Image Credit: Sanjal’s Facebook Account
Gavande told in a recent interview that-
“I am really happy that my childhood dream is about to come true. I am proud to be a part of Team Blue Origin.”
Sanjal Has Always Been Interested in Spaceships
Sanjal Gavande is the daughter of a municipal corporation employee and a retired MTNL official, opted for aerospace as a subject in her master’s and cleared it with a first-class.
Her father Ashok Gavande shared in a recent interview that she always wanted to build a spaceship and that is the reason she chose aerospace as a subject while pursuing her master’s degree at Michigan Technological University.
Also Read: Vandi Verma: Indian-origin NASA Engineer drives Perseverance Rover on Mars
Sanjal’s Work Experience
Sanjal Gavande had worked with Mercury Marine, the marine engine division of Brunswick Corporation, after finishing her masters at Wisconsin.
After working at Mercury Marine for three years first as a design analysis intern and then as a design analysis engineer, she joined Toyota Racing Development as a mechanical design engineer.
NASA has Rejected Sanjal in the Past
Sanjal Gavande holds a commercial pilot’s license, applied for a space engineering job at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) but she was not selected that time over some citizenship issues.
Sajal’s mother Surekha told that-
“People told us that she is a girl, so why has she opted for mechanical engineering? I also thought sometimes about whether she would be able to handle such hard work. She has now made us all proud. She had a dream of design aerospace rockets and she has achieved it.”
Also Read: Sirisha Bandla: the Second Indian-origin Woman to Fly to Space with Richard Branson
Working with Blue Origin
She has been working with Blue Origin in Seattle as a systems engineer since April this year. She was also a part-time public relations chair and chairman of the board of The Ninety-Nines, which is a non-profit educational organisation.
Also Read: Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos will fly to space in July
Bezos’ Space Mission
Bezos, the former CEO of Amazon.com Inc, is due to be part of a four-person crew for a planned 11-minute ride to the edge of space on Tuesday inside his company Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft. He is set to be joined by his brother and private equity executive Mark Bezos and a woman aviator Wally Funk.
Blue Origin announced this week that Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old high school graduate from the Netherlands, would join the crew. Jeff Bezos chose July 20 as the launch date to honour the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.
