Who is Anil Menon and what is his role on the ISS
Anil Menon is a NASA astronaut, an American from Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is flying as flight engineer on Expedition 75 aboard the International Space Station, on what is his first trip to space. His background is arguably one of the most unusual on the crew: he arrives on the ISS after years spent on the front line of medical emergencies, both on the ground and in the private space industry.
An unusual dual profile: ER doctor and military officer
Menon holds the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force. Within the military, he served as a flight surgeon supporting the 45th Space Wing and the 173rd Fighter Wing, logging more than 100 sorties in the F-15 fighter jet and serving on a critical care air transport team that moved more than 100 patients. In parallel, he is a practicing emergency medicine physician, with fellowship training in both wilderness medicine and aerospace medicine — a combination built exactly for operating under adverse conditions, whether on a mountainside, inside a fighter jet, or in orbit.
SpaceX's first flight surgeon
Before his selection as an astronaut, Menon had already worked for NASA as a crew flight surgeon across several ISS expeditions, gaining direct experience with the program from the ground. That path led him to become SpaceX's first flight surgeon, a role in which he helped launch the company's first humans to space during NASA's Demo-2 mission, and in which he built SpaceX's medical organization from scratch to support future crewed missions.
Real disaster-response experience
His record as an emergency physician includes being among the first responders on the ground after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the 2015 Nepal earthquake, and the 2011 Reno Air Show accident — three very different events that all demand the same skill: making critical medical decisions with incomplete information and limited resources under extreme pressure.
Career stats as an astronaut
- 1 spaceflight (Expedition 75, currently underway).
- 0 spacewalks to date.
- Over 16 days accumulated in space so far, a partial number still rising as his mission continues.
💡 Fun fact: it's rare for one person to have been a first responder at two earthquakes, a physician at an air show accident, an F-15 flight surgeon, and the first person to ever hold that role at SpaceX. That track record makes Menon one of the most valuable medical assets on Expedition 75, equally prepared for a clinical emergency or the operational strain of a long-duration mission.
You can find more biographical details on Anil Menon on his Wikipedia page.
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