Paris (AFP)
European Space Agency (ESA) Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti will fly on a new mission aboard the International Space Station in 2022, ESA said on Wednesday.
This will be the second time on the ISS for the astronaut, who had set the record for the longest stay in space for a woman on a mission.
It had then spent 199 days in orbit, in 2014 and 2015.
"I am ready to dive into the ISS (...) which is like my second home," Samantha Cristoforetti told a press conference, adding that ESA astronauts "are already looking towards the sea. next step, that is to say the Moon ".
The European agency is participating in the American Artemis program aimed at first establishing the Gateway, a space station in orbit around the Earth satellite, before landing astronauts there.
This participation "guarantees to Europe the sending of three of its astronauts on the Gateway in this decade", recalled David Parker, director of human and robotic exploration of the ESA, during a press conference.
The first flights to the Moon, around 2025, will be reserved for the current generation of astronauts, to which Samantha Cristoforetti belongs.
Aged 43, this former fighter pilot is the first Italian woman astronaut.
"Samantha is an example to follow for all those who are currently applying to become an astronaut in the framework of the recruitment recently announced by ESA", commented the Director General of the European Space Agency, Josef Aschbacher.
On the ISS, it will continue "the essential work of our European scientists in orbit".
In particular, she will be able to work on the new Russian scientific module, MLM, which could arrive at the station in July.
Samantha Cristoforetti, who will take off in spring 2022 on a still undetermined commercial rocket, will take over from Austrian ESA astronaut Mathias Maurer, who is due to join the ISS in October 2021. The latter will take over from the French astronaut Thomas Pesquet who is due to go into orbit on April 20.
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