One benefit of working at the European Space Agency is the frequent encounters with Astronauts. Although meeting them in the hallway has become fairly common, these people are still superheroes in the minds of most people working here and thus it is always a nice experience. Going to space is, after all, a dream for most of us working in the sector and the media that most of us consume, Astronauts are like our reality stars.
So it was really cool when for the last day of my work before taking holiday, to have one of the most popular European Astronauts come by to hold a lecture for young students in Paris.
Thomas Pesquet official Astronaut photo
Thomas Pesquet is a French Astronaut who spent roughly 8 months at the International Space Station from November 2016 to June 2017 as a part of Expedition 50 and Expedition 51. Thomas Pesquet is also fairly young astronaut at 39 years of age, and with more than 750 000 followers on his Twitter account, Thomas has done a lot of great outreach both to young people and space enthusiasts around the world. Indeed, few astronauts have caught the public's attention, at least in Europe, more than him much thanks to his mission also involving a lot of educational material. This means that a lot of European pupils and students, as well as their parents, have been exposed to Thomas. The Proxima mission Thomas carried out included no less than 50 science experiments, some of which were also shared with students live from the International Space Station for them to also observe and engage. These have included coding challenges, watching crystals grow in microgravity, math demonstrations related to his own fitness and nutricion tests, etc.
With the European Space Agency's headquarters being located in Paris, the French Astronaut is, of course, extra popular here. It was therefore no surprise to find the room filled up with eager young students when I took some time off from my work to go see his presentation.
The ESA Headquarters hosts a giant conference room used for meetings of all the 22 Member states. The same room was used for Thomas's presentation and filled with Parisian youngsters.
Me holding up a brochure detailing and explaining Thomas's mission. Notice the back of my laptop with the amazing @steemSTEM sticker in the background ;)
Afterwards, the visitors flocked to take a picture with their hero. The kid in me sure wanted to push aside the young ones to secure a spot next to Thomas, but I managed to resist my urge!
Anyways, it was a nice little treat and gave some extra vibe to the day. It also served as a good reminder of how lucky I am to be the place where I am, seeing how meeting an astronaut and getting to be inside the headquarters meant so much to the students. And while I have no plans of applying to become an astronaut myself, the idea did emerge that it would be pretty cool. I mean, who wouldn't want to float around in weightlessness playing the saxophone whilst looking down at our beautiful planet such as Thomas have?
Thomas with his Saxophone onboard the International Space Station
Unfortunately, I never found the opportunity to take a picture with Thomas, as he had to hurry on to a new meeting and stopping for a picture would leave him needing to do the same for everyone. But I'll sure save that for next time!
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