French astronaut Sophie Adenot will fly in 2026 for a mission aboard the International Space Station

The 41-year-old helicopter pilot completed her basic training in Cologne (Germany) and is continuing her preparation in Houston (United States). Details of its future mission have not yet been revealed.

She will be the second French woman to stay aboard the ISS, after Claudie Haigneré in 2001. Astronaut Sophie Adenot will go on a mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS) in 2026, announced the European Space Agency ( ESA), Wednesday May 22. Two first missions were revealed for the five career astronauts of the ESA class of 2022, during an agency Space Council in Brussels. In addition to Sophie Adenot, the Belgian Raphaël Liégeois was assigned to a mission. The former helicopter test pilot will be the first to take to the skies.

“I’m super happy. I know it’s going to be two very intense years before takeoff, but I’m super happy”, she reacted to franceinfo. And to add: “This announcement came very quickly, a bit of a surprise, and I am very honored.”

“As exploration activities grow at an unprecedented pace, sending two newly qualified ESA astronauts into space is a crucial step in preserving European know-how”, commented the director of the European Space Agency, Josef Aschbacher. According to him, these two new missions make it possible to “[garantir] Europe’s long-term participation in ongoing programs such as Artemis as well as any future projects involving human spaceflight and exploration.”

The five astronauts of the class of 2022 graduated on April 22 at the end of their basic training (basic training), which lasted one year, at the astronaut center in Cologne (Germany).

In terms of pace, Sophie Adenot expects her schedule to be more dense than last year. “We are moving up a gear, particularly because we have to acquire all the qualifications, from the most basic to the most sophisticated”she explained to franceinfo.

Arriving in the United States at the beginning of May, Sophie Adenot has already started the rest of her preparation at the space center of NASA, the American space agency, located in Houston (Texas). On the program: numerous training sessions relating to extravehicular exits, that is to say going out into space outside the ISS, placed in orbit 400 km above our heads. She is currently following “theorical class” on these outings: “The first pool training is not for now, it will come in a few weeks”she said.

The details of the missions of Sophie Adenot and Raphaël Liégeois are not yet known and will be revealed gradually. The only clarification cautiously provided by the French astronaut concerns the period planned for his departure. “For the moment, takeoff is planned for spring 2026”she confides, recalling that this deadline must be taken with a grain of salt, because everything can change in the space sector.