British Paralympian the first astronaut with special needs

In a world first, a disabled Brit has been selected for astronaut training by the European Space Agency (ESA).

Joining the ESA class of 2022 astronauts is John McFall, from the United Kingdom, as an astronaut with a physical disability. #ESAastro2022

👉https://t.co/E0SLagZTjv pic.twitter.com/0Yr5W8xv5D

— ESA (@esa) November 23, 2022

John McFall will join the space training corps to work with designers and engineers to see if he can be the first disabled person to go into space.

John McFall is a British Paralympic sprinter from Surrey who lost his leg in a motorbike accident when he was 19.

John will join the training corps as a para-astronaut as part of a study investigating what needs to be adapted and redesigned. However, it may be several years before it can go into space.. If possible.

The European Space Agency (ESA) announced the Astronaut Training Class of 2022 at a press conference in Paris today following the conclusion of the work of the ESA Council at ministerial level.

The new class (ESA Astronaut Class 2022) includes five career astronauts who will immediately join the existing European astronaut corps, some runners-up or “reserves” (who will at least temporarily continue to be employed in their current jobs) and – for the first time – a para-astronaut with a physical disability.

The five new astronauts who will staff ESA are a French rescue helicopter pilot, a British astrophysicist, a Spanish engineer, a Belgian biomedical engineer with a PhD in neuroscience and a Swiss doctor. The “reserves” are also considered astronauts, but their training will be activated when a need arises. The para-astronaut – a world first for Europe – is Britain’s John McFaul, a Paralympic road racer who lost a leg in a car accident when he was 19.

The selection was made among 22,523 candidates (17,126 men and 5,397 women) who had initially applied from the member states, while 831 men and 530 women had advanced to the next round. From Greece, 281 nominations were initially submitted (220 men and 60 women), while 22 men and two women qualified for the next selection phase.

The new astronauts will be presented at the European Astronaut Center in Cologne, Germany. After completing 12 months of training, they will begin training for missions to the International Space Station and, at a later stage, to other more distant missions such as to the Moon.

German ESA Director General Josef Asbacher also announced that the meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Member States finally approved the funding of ESA with 16.92 billion euros for the three years 2023-25, compared to 14.51 in the period 2019-22 (17% budget increase). Most funds will be directed to the scientific program (3.2 billion euros, 19 percent), space transport-launches (2.8 billion, 17 percent), human and robotic space exploration (2.7 billion euros, 16%), in observing the Earth from space (2.7 billion euros, 16%) and in telecommunications from space (1.9 billion euros, 11%).

Skai.gr, APE-MPE, BBC

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