Britain’s New Astronaut

Posted on May 20th, 2009

History was made today as the European Space Agency (ESA) announced their new batch of astronauts, the first batch in quite a long time. The main surprise of the announcement was the acceptance of Timothy Peake, a Briton, into ESA’s Astronaut Corps.

Major Peake is Britain’s first astronaut since Helen Sharman who flew to the Mir space station on a Russian rocket in 1991. There have been various other British born astronauts since Helen, however they have all flown as American citizens. Timothy’s previous life was as a helicopter pilot for the Army, followed by his role as a test-pilot. When asked of his new job as an astronaut he called it, “The pinnacle of my career”.

What’s currently unknown is the repercussions this decision with have on the Government’s plans for UK involvement with ESA, or a national space programme. I hope that it will encourage more interaction from the UK towards human space-flight, an area which has been historically hard to get involved in if you’re British. What can safely be said is that this is a very exciting time and signals the next stage of space exploration for Europe as a whole.