Sixty years after Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin was sent into space, Frenchman Thomas Pesquet is about to leave for the second time for the International Space Station (ISS).
Asked about RTL 10 days before his departure, the former Rouennais is delighted to rediscover the sensations of "
weightlessness, lightness
", "
to free oneself from the constraints of his body
" but also team cohesion, "
this feeling of mission, where everyone has the same goal
”.
To discover
A lead to explain the rare thromboses linked to the AstraZeneca vaccine
Read also: 60 years ago, Youri Gagarin, the first man in space
After a 24-hour trip, aboard Space X's Crew Dragon shuttle, the Frenchman will find four other researchers, including two Russians, within the ISS for “
a long-term mission
” and partly take over command. from the international station.
“
An honor”
for the Frenchman who “
dreams of going to the Moon
” before joining Mars.
“We still have a lot of research to do on the Moon, there is a lot to learn, but we know above all that it is a mandatory repetition,
resolves the astronaut.
[...] If we do not know how to make the space station, we will never know how to go to the Moon.
And if we don't know how to go to the Moon, we will never know how to go to Mars.
It is 1000 times more difficult, it is 1000 times further ”
.
Go to Mars in 2024, "I don't believe it"
Is a trip to Mars by 2024 possible, as Elon Musk envisions?
The Frenchman struggles to believe it, "
especially in the proportions in which he indicates it, with extremely large crews
".
For him,
“if we are on the Moon in 2024, that we are in the process of building a permanent base there, it will already be superb”
.
The latter still has a lot to teach us: "
We must go back and stay there to make it a base for international cooperation and to do scientific research
."