The agency has unveiled its new promotion of astronauts, which has a total of two women and three men. Sophie Adenot thus becomes the first French astronaut since Claudie Haigneré.
MO12345LEMONDE With AFP
France had no longer counted as a woman astronaut since Claudie Haigneré, in 1996. Wednesday, November 23, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced that the French Sophie Adenot, 40, had been retained in the new promotion European astronauts, which has a total of two women and three men.
Sophie Adenot, helicopter pilot of the Army, “embodies an example for the future of women in scientific and technical circles, where they are still under represented (less than one in ten astronauts is a woman ) “, said in a joint press release the Ministry of the Economy and that of higher education. Another Frenchman, Arnaud Prost, was selected in the reserve corps of promotion 2022.
This promotion, chosen from nearly 23,000 candidates, succeeds that of 2009 who, with Thomas Pesquet in particular, had aroused a real enthusiasm for the space adventure among young Europeans.
When ESA launched its recruitment campaign in February 2001, Claudie Haigneré had also warned on the constitution of “monocultural and monolithic crews”. “We have the social responsibility to represent the world as we want tomorrow,” she said.
a budget of 17 billion euros
Furthermore, the European space agency announced a budget of almost 17 billion euros earlier for the next three years, upstart but below the 18.5 billion which were requested by its general manager. At the end of harsh negotiations, the 22 member states, gathered for two days in Paris, decided an envelope of 16.9 billion euros, up 17 % compared to the last three years.
This is a “great success”, praised the French Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire, believing that the budget was going “beyond expectations”. Paris increased up to 3.25 billion euros, the contributions of other countries not being known immediately.
“Given the level of inflation, I am very impressed by this result,” said ESA boss Josef Aschbacher, judging that the budget voted was “necessary not to miss the train “Faced with fierce American and Chinese competition in particular.
This contribution is intended to finance spatial exploration programs (2.7 billion euros), earth observation in particular to measure and monitor climate change (2.7 billion) or even space launchers , in particular the developments of the Ariane 6 and Vega-C rockets (2.8 billion euros).