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Only In The Rocket City

November 8, 2024 | Reading Time: 2 minutes
Dr. Pavel Barahona Rubio (right) with his high-flying cousin Frank Rubio (left) and a fellow astronaut at NASA's Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston.

When Dr. Pavel Barahona Rubio says his first cousin Frank set a high bar for the rest of their family, he’s not kidding.

Frank Rubio holds the NASA record for longest single duration spaceflight by a U.S. astronaut after spending 371 consecutive days aboard the International Space Station (from Sept. 21, 2022, until Sept. 27, 2023). He traveled more than 157 million miles and conducted three space walks during the Expedition 68 mission.

If that’s not impressive enough, Frank is also a West Point graduate, U.S. Army colonel, decorated Blackhawk helicopter pilot and board-certified family physician and flight surgeon.

“Everyone in my family is obviously very proud of Frank,” says Dr. Barahona Rubio, who practices family medicine at Huntsville Hospital Physician Care-Lowell Drive.

The family traces its roots to El Salvador, but Dr. Barahona Rubio’s parents and many other relatives, including Frank’s mother, fled the small Central American nation to escape a bloody civil war that killed more than 75,000 people between 1979 and 1992.

Dr. Barahona Rubio grew up in Puebla, Mexico; Frank, a few years older, was raised mostly in southern California.

But Alabama figures into both of their stories.

Dr. Barahona Rubio left Mexico as a teenager and came to live with an aunt in Mobile. After graduating from McGill-Toolen Catholic High School and the University of Montevallo, he returned to Mexico for medical school. He completed his residency in family medicine at UAB’s Huntsville Regional Medical Campus over the summer and joined the team at HH Physician Care-Lowell Drive on September 1. He hopes to start the area’s first medical society for Spanish-speaking physicians.

“I’ve come to love Alabama,” Dr. Barahona Rubio said. “It’s an amazing place.”

Frank Rubio, according to his NASA bio, served as a clinic supervisor, executive medicine provider and flight surgeon at Redstone Arsenal. He also has family in the Auburn area, which brings him back to Alabama from time to time.

Photo above: Dr. Pavel Barahona Rubio (right) with his high-flying cousin Frank Rubio (left) and a fellow astronaut at NASA’s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston.

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