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Thomas Gautier PESQUET

ESA astronaut, France

DATE AND PLACE OF BIRTH:
Born in Rouen, Seine-Maritime Department of Haute-Normadie Region, France.

EDUCATION:
In 1998 Thomas Pesquet graduated from the Lycee Pierre Cornielle in Rouen. In 2001, he received a master's degree from the Ecole Nationale SupErieure de I'Aeronautique et de I'Espace in Toulouse. In 2004 Pesquet entered and in 2006 graduated from the Air France flight school, got an Air Transport Pilot License-Instrument Rating (ATPL-IR).

HOBBY:
Enjoys basketball, jogging, swimming, squash, scuba diving, kite surfing, sailing, skiing, mountaineering. He has a black belt in judo.
His other interests include travelling, playing the saxophone and reading.

WORK EXPERIENCE:
From April to September 2001, Thomas was a trainee engineer with Thales Alenia Space in Cannes, France. From October 2001 to 2002, he worked as a spacecraft dynamics engineer on remote sensing missions for GMV S.A. in Madrid, Spain.
In 2002-2004 Thomas worked at the French Space Agency (CNES) as a research engineer.
Before the enlistment in the Cosmonaut Corps. he was a pilot-instructor of the Airbus-320s in Air France.
By the time of selection as an astronaut candidate he had logged more than 2500 flight hours on different types of airliners.

On May 20, 2009 Thomas was selected as an ESA astronaut (the 4-th selection). Upon completion of the course of the astronaut basic training at an official ceremony conducted on November 22, 2010 at the European Astronaut Center in Cologne, Germany he received the ESA Astronaut Certificate.
On September 13, 2010 Tomas Pesquet reported to Yu.A. Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center for the training session. The Program of this training course which lasted till November 14, 2010 included learning the Russian language, familiarization with the ISS Russian Segment, Soyuz TMA vehicle and Sokol spacesuit, as well as flying the Tu-134 to make visual - instrumental observation.
In September 2013 Thomas participated as a flight manager in a 5-day mission in the Aquarius undersea research laboratory at a depth of 20 m near the Florida coast providing communications with the astronauts present there: Joseph Acaba, Kathleen Rubins, Soichi Noguchi and Andreas Mogensen. The trainings passed in the scope of preparation for extravehicular activity.
On March 17, 2014 General Director of ESA Jean-Jacques Dordain announced that Thomas Pesquet was assigned to the prime crew of the ISS-50/51 Expedition.
At the meeting of the Interdepartmental Commission which was held on December 16, 2014 for selection of cosmonauts and their assignment to the crews of the manned spacecraft and stations his assignment to the backup crew of the ISS-48/49 long-term Expedition and the prime crew of the ISS-50/51 long-term Expedition was approved.

August 2015.
Based on the data of sites www.astronaut.ru, www.esa.int.