Kimiya Yui

I love that this guy grew up in Kawakami, a high-altitude lettuce-farming village tucked in the Nagano mountains, just staring up at one of the biggest, clearest skies in Japan, and then actually went and flew off into it. From the National Defense Academy to a fighter cockpit in the Air Self-Defense Force to JAXA and a stint living on the International Space Station, his whole arc reads like a kid's dream that somebody refused to put down. What gets me, though, is the temperament: born in 1970, an Aquarius, and by every account he comes across as soft-spoken, humble, weirdly calm for someone with that resume. That mix of feet-on-the-ground steadiness and wide-eyed curiosity is exactly the kind of person you want carrying a country's hopes upward. Honestly, watching someone like him makes me a little proud too.

Kimiya Yui is a Japanese astronaut and former Japan Air Self-Defense Force pilot, born on January 30, 1970, in Kawakami Village, Nagano Prefecture. He graduated from the National Defense Academy of Japan and went on to serve as a fighter pilot before being selected as a JAXA astronaut. He is known for his participation in long-duration missions aboard the International Space Station.

Name (English)

Kimiya Yui

Name (Japanese)

油井亀美也

Reading

ゆい きみや

Born

January 30, 1970 (age 56)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Aquarius / Dog (戌)

Origin

Kawakami Village, Nagano Prefecture, Japan

Occupation

Astronaut / Japan Air Self-Defense Force Officer

University

National Defense Academy of Japan

Motto

Private

• Xhttps://x.com/Astro_Kimiya
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%B2%B9%E4%BA%95%E4%BA%80%E7%BE%8E%E4%B9%9F

Tags

• From Nagano Prefecture
• Astronaut
• Air Self-Defense Force Officer

Last updated

2026-06-02

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.