European Space Agency: the French Sophie Adenot in the new class

by time news November 27, 2022

November 27, 2022

In the footsteps of Claudie Haigneré, the first French astronaut. Sophie Adenot has been selected in the new promotion of European astronauts, which has three men and two women, announced this Wednesday, November 23 the European Space Agency (ESA).

This promotion, chosen from nearly 23,000 candidates, succeeds that of 2009 which, with Thomas Pesquet in particular, had aroused a real enthusiasm for the space adventure among young Europeans. The class of 2009 had six astronauts, including only one woman, the Italian Samantha Cristoforetti.

Aged 40, Sophie Adenot is an engineer, graduated from the National School of Aeronautics and Space. She holds the rank of lieutenant colonel, was the first female helicopter test pilot and has some 3,000 flying hours.

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“We worked hard to get here today,” she said. On the podium of the ephemeral Grand Palais in Paris, it was then a 31-year-old Briton, Rosemary Coogan, who was presented by ESA officials.

The three men are the Swiss Marco Sieber, the Spaniard Pablo Alvarez Fernandez and the Belgian Raphaël Liégeois. The nationality of the astronauts selected takes into account the balance between countries and their financial contribution to the ESA budget. Their training should begin in the spring. The first mission in orbit for the first of them is not planned before 2026.

A budget of nearly 17 billion euros, up sharply

The European Space Agency has also announced a budget of nearly 17 billion euros for the next three years, a marked increase but below the 18.5 billion requested by its director general.

It is a “great success”, welcomed the French Minister of Economy Bruno Le Maire, believing that the budget went “beyond expectations”. Paris abounded to the tune of 3.25 billion euros, the contributions of the other countries not being known immediately.

This contribution is intended to finance space exploration programs (2.7 billion euros), Earth observation programs in particular to measure and monitor climate change (2.7 billion) or even space launchers, in particular upgrades to the Ariane 6 and Vega-C rockets (2.8 billion euros).