Sophie Adenot, the French astronaut to beat house – It’s in France | EUROtoday

To be discovered within the present

Since her childhood, Sophie Adenot has dreamed of going into house. She was first impressed by her grandfather, a former mechanic within the Air Force, then by Claudie Haigneré, the primary French girl to change into an astronaut. “The day Claudie took off, I said to myself: ‘That’s it, there is a woman astronaut, it’s possible!'”, Sophie Adenot tells us about Claudie Haigneré’s flight in 1996 to the Mir station which she adopted with fascination on tv.

An distinctive journey

An engineer by coaching, graduated from ISAE Supaero, the Higher Institute of Aeronautics and Space in Toulouse, and from the distinguished Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston (United States), Sophie Adenot started her profession at Airbus, earlier than becoming a member of the Air Force on the age of 23. In 2019, she turned the primary feminine helicopter take a look at pilot in France.

After a primary unsuccessful try in 2008, Sophie Adenot is taking part once more in 2021 within the choice of astronauts for the European Space Agency (ESA). This time, she is one in all 5 candidates chosen from among the many 22,500 candidates.

Intense preparation

Then started intensive coaching lasting virtually three years, offered between Germany, France, the United States and even Japan. Simulations of extra-vehicular outings in swimming swimming pools, digital actuality coaching, survival programs, Sophie Adenot’s potential to stay calm in excessive conditions and to work below stress is a significant asset. “She is very determined, she knows how to make sense of things in critical situations, she is fundamentally empathetic and motivated, determined to achieve the objective,” underlines Daniel Neuenschwander, director of human and robotic exploration at ESA.

The ISS: a flying laboratory

On board the ISS, Sophie Adenot will face scientific and technical challenges. It will perform round 200 experiments, together with some within the area of spatial ultrasound.

The station will even be a spot of surprise. “On board the ISS, we orbit the Earth in 90 minutes, so sixteen times a day, we see a sunrise. These are magical moments,” confides Claudie Haigneré, who stayed on the International Space Station in 2001.

Sophie Adenot, too, needs to maintain the important in thoughts: the surprise of a childhood dream come true.