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The remarkable life story of Jonny Kim reads like three separate superhero stories rolled into one; he’s a Navy SEAL, Harvard educated doctor and an astronaut. As is common with superheroes, Kim’s incredible achievements in adult life follow harrowing childhood experiences that have shaped his destiny and left him determined to leave a positive mark on the world, but with that achieved his amazing journey looks set to take him far beyond Earth’s atmosphere. He’s preparing for his role in NASA’s next lunar landing missions, and may very well be one of the first humans to travel to Mars; a True Superhero who is determined to leave a positive mark on more than one planet.

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A scared little boy

Jonny was born in 1984 in Los Angeles, to a first-generation Korean immigrant family. His parents ran a liquor store, and his mother also worked as a nurse but their home life was troubled from the start. Jonny’s father was an alcoholic, and abusive primarily toward his wife but because she was extremely resilient he would often torment their two sons as the most effective way of getting to her. Jonny later described how he would be afraid to fall asleep for fear of how he would be woken due to his father’s habit of throwing a glass of water in his face and then forcing him to choose which of two toys his father should break. 

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Jonny was a straight A student but his tempestuous homelife negatively impacted every other aspect of his life. As he later explained on the Jocko Podcast of his former SEALs’ Commander Jocko Willink: “I was a scared little boy. Scared of the world, scared of relationships, scared of talking to people, going to school, of having my own opinions, speaking up or fighting for what I believe is right. I was so scared, deathly scared of my father.” This changed in 1999 when Jonny was 16 and a friend told him about the Navy SEALs. Jonny immediately knew this was what he wanted to do and told his mother of his plan. She was aghast, wanting him to go to college, but Jonny saw the SEALs as the best way to protect his mother and younger brother from his father. As events transpired, they would not need protection for much longer; in 2002 things came to a head when Jonny’s father came home early from work, reeking of whiskey and threatening his family with a gun. Jonny attempted to defend his mother and brother, only for his father to pepper spray him in the face. Ultimately, police arrived and, after a standoff in the attic of the family home, Jonny’s father was shot dead.

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Jonny has talked of how these tragic events shaped his future, telling Willink: “It taught me and set the benchmark for me to do so many more things in my life, because I don’t think I was meant to be a SEAL. I don’t think I was born to do any of the things that I’ve had the opportunity to do but because of those experiences… to be able to do something that I never thought I could possibly do, standing up to someone - especially someone who was threatening to kill you and the person you loved most - was empowering. It liberated me and taught me I’m not the scared little boy I thought I was. I can do these things. I know I can be a part of something bigger than myself.” With this new self belief, Jonny set off a few months later to join the Navy SEALs.

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A teams guy

Jonny trained initially as a combat medic and then as a sniper. On completing his training he was immediately deployed to Iraq where he served two tours undertaking over 100 combat missions as a medic, sniper, navigator and point man, and earning several medals for bravery including a Silver Star for rescuing multiple wounded Iraqi soldiers in the face of enemy fire. These experiences further shaped his outlook and ambition, as he later told Willink: “We accept the risks of our occupation for the greater good of what it does for society, our country, our species, and that’s also relevant in space exploration, in NASA… We accept the risks of what we are trying to do for the general good and what it brings back to humanity.”

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The next stop on Jonny’s journey was medical school and, in 2009 he enrolled at the University of San Diego. While studying, he supported himself financially as a Parking Enforcement Officer at the university. This may have struck observers as a strange occupation for a decorated war hero, but Kim saw the role as an exercise in humility: “You should never think you’re too good to do a job… because the moment you start to think you’re better than anyone else you have poisoned yourself, you are on the dark path.” After completing a Bachelor’s degree in mathematics he applied to Harvard Medical School where he met astronaut and physician Scott Parazynski, who encouraged him to apply for NASA’s Astronaut Candidate program. 

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To the Moon… and beyond?

Kim completed his studies at Harvard in 2016 and the following year beat over 18,000 applicants to be named as one of the 12 new astronauts making up NASA Astronaut Group 22. In 2020, he was selected as part of Artemis Team 1, the group who will form the crew of Artemis III, the first manned mission to the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. With three manned Artemis missions already scheduled, and five more planned between now and 2032, Jonny’s role in humanity’s next phase of lunar landings seems assured, but NASA’s ultimate ambitions for Astronaut Group 22 lie further afield. The Artemis program is viewed as a stepping stone toward future crewed missions to Mars, mooted to take place in the late 2030s, and Jonny’s status as one of only two trained physicians within Astronaut Group 22 makes his participation in those missions seem highly probable. When asked about his feelings on this, and the possible dangers of such a mission, Jonny gave a response that combined the icy detachment of a Navy SEAL with a gallows humor joke worthy of a True Superhero: “If NASA determined some degree of radiation risk was necessary to make a trip to Mars, that certainly would fit within my risk profile. A lot of people make a lot of sacrifices for things. And if I can have a chance to leave a positive contribution, it’s a small risk to pay in the end. I think maybe it also helps that I already have children!”

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