Who was the first astronaut to tweet? If you try to Google, you probably find the Mike Massimino. But that’s not all the truth. Yes, Mike has drafted the first tweet from space on the Day 2 of the STS-125 mission. But we technically can’t name him the first astronaut to tweet.
The First Astronaut to Draft a Tweet from Space
I don’t want to make it sound like I’m taking away the achievement of Mike Massimino.
He shattered a handrail on the Hubble Space Telescope and had to fix it with brute force and ingenuity. A New Yorker through and through, Massimino grew up gazing at the stars from his suburban backyard. At adulthood, he’s floating 350 miles above Earth, tweeting from space before it was cool. Actually, he drafted a tweet and sent it as an email to the Johnson Space Center. And the staff posted the tweet to Mike’s Twitter.
From orbit: Launch was awesome!! I am feeling great, working hard, & enjoying the magnificent views, the adventure of a lifetime has begun!
— Mike Massimino (@Astro_Mike) May 12, 2009
But his story isn’t just about the tweets. He was rejected by NASA three times. Most would’ve thrown in the towel, but not Massimino. He doubled down, got a Ph.D., and even corrected his eyesight to meet NASA’s stringent requirements. The fourth time was a shot, and he got in.
And he was participating in an extremely important mission to repair a Hubble Telescope. One wrong move is game over for billion-dollar equipment and no more beautiful, charming space photos. No pressure, right? Yet, Massimino pulled it off, not once but twice, making him a space legend and a social media sensation.
He’s not done yet; these days, he’s shaping the next generations as a professor. So, if you ever think the sky’s the limit, remember Mike Massimino; he proved there’s nothing you can’t achieve
You can visit his blog and read his full bio.
The First Astronaut to Tweet?
And the first astronaut to post a tweet from space was Timothy Creamer. He’s less known than Mike, but he’s technically the first astronaut to tweet from space.
He’s better known as TJ Creamer, born into a military family; TJ had discipline and adventure in his blood. But instead of following the traditional path, he set his sights much higher on outer space.
Fast forward through years of rigorous training and academic grind, TJ found himself at NASA. But this wasn’t a smooth ride; the competition was fierce, and the training was brutal. Imagine being spun around at dizzying speeds to simulate G-forces or plunged into underwater simulations to mimic zero gravity. TJ aced them all, earning his International Space Station (ISS) ticket.
The launch day arrived. Strapped into a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, TJ felt the engines roar to life. Within minutes, he was catapulted into the cosmos, leaving Earth’s atmosphere far behind. The ISS became his new home, a floating laboratory zipping around the planet at 17,500 miles per hour.
Then came the groundbreaking moment: TJ became the first person to live-tweet from space. He bridged the cosmic divide with a few taps on the keyboard, sharing real-time updates and awe-inspiring photos with Earthlings. It was a game-changer, making space feel just a little bit closer to home.
Hello Twitterverse! We r now LIVE tweeting from the International Space Station — the 1st live tweet from Space! 🙂 More soon, send your ?s
— TJ Creamer (@Astro_TJ) January 22, 2010
After 163 days in space, TJ returned to Earth a changed man. Not just because he had circled the globe 2,500 times but because he had pushed the boundaries of human capability and brought the cosmos to our fingertips.
