Linda Godwin, a former NASA astronaut and a veteran of four space shuttle missions, knows what it’s like to spend a significant time in space. She chalked up more than 38 days in orbit. She carried out two spacewalks, becoming the first woman to do so outside two space stations with a six-hour spacewalk in March 1996 at Russia’s Mir space station that orbited Earth from 1986 to 2001, and another outside the International Space Station in December 2001.

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Leonard David has been reporting on space activities for nearly 50 years. He is the 2010 winner of the prestigious National Space Club Press Award and recently co-authored with Apollo 11’s Buzz Aldrin the book “Mission to Mars — My Vision for Space...