Debate during the European Youth Event 2016 in Strasbourg with Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA)

Strasbourg

debate

McGUINNESS, Mairead (EPP, IE)

European Youth Event 2016 (T)

European Space Agency (acronym)

CRISTOFORETTI, Samantha

Earth from above. My extraordinary 200 days in space. extracts from the EYE debate with Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA)

SOUNDBITE (English), Mairead MCGUINNESS (EPP, IE), Moderator, I really could give a long introduction to your career, but I don't think there is any need because you are unique individual, a very unique woman because you have a record for your time spent in space. Let us hear from this very unique and amazing woman. Applause.

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): I am a member of the European Astronaut corps and I had a chance, between November 2014 and last year in June, to spend 200 days in space.

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): For me it was a childhood dream. It was something I have been dreaming about since I was a little girl and I won't lie to you, I have worked hard to get there. I was also very fortunate to get the right opportunities at the right time and finally that dream went into fulfilment on that night. So that was the magic moment where it all became a reality for me. In Kazakhstan in Baikonur, this magic place where the history of the human exploration of space really started with people like Uri Gagarin and Valentina Tarashkova, we all learned about when we were little children, the first human beings who went to space.

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): A lot of the time we as astronauts are actually the subject of the experiments. We are the operators and the subjects at the same time.

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): One of my favourite things was just to go to the Cupola at a random time, and we call it the blue planet for a reason so you see a lot of water. A lot of times so if you just go up in the Cupola in a random time you will see this big distance of blue and maybe some moon glint and some sun glint, it is very, very peaceful. This gives you a sense of peace and of looking at things at a very long term. It is like detaching yourself of everyday jittery.

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): After 200 days it was time to leave, so we said our goodbyes to the Cupola, to the Earth form up there, to our crew mates, got in our space suits, they have waited for us for 200 days and detach ourselves form the space station. It was a pretty wild ride back. ... and then here you are and you have bunch of people surrounding you. End of presentation and applause.

SOUNDBITE (English), Mairead MCGUINNESS (EPP, IE), Moderator, Paula, on twitter has the following question: Being back on Earth, what do you miss most about space?

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): I guess two things: One just in terms of physical sensations is weightlessness. I mean it is just amazing. It is just being light to the extreme, everything is effortless. If I wanted to go from here to there I would just had to push myself with a little finger like that with almost no effort and then, sure enough if I push in the right direction, I would slowly be floating all the way up there. You have this sensation that every minute that you are doing something it is a minute that you are using in a very, very meaningful way and that is something I don't think I really have in my normal life.

Question from the public: Thank you for being here today, thank you for coming and sharing your story. My question is: do you believe in aliens or any kind of intellectual creatures outside of this galaxy?

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): It is an open question and by aliens I mean I guess life on other planet which could be intelligent or could be even bacteria, who knows. I think we are pretty close to answering the question about Mars for example. It would be really exciting to find at least traces of past life on Mars; at least we know that it's not unique to Earth.

Question from the public: What does it mean for Samantha Cristoforetti being European? We are in the centre of Europe, we are in the heart of Europe, and what does it mean for you bringing European value outside there?

SOUNDBITE (English) Samantha CRISTOFORETTI, Astronaut, European Space Agency (ESA): You might be French or German or whatever but when you find yourselves as Europeans outside of Europe you immediately have that feeling that there is something that connects you, that makes you different from everybody else. Not better or anything, but you just start talking about yourselves as Europeans.  (...) I don't know if it is the history, the culture or some particular ways of looking at certain values of equality, of democracy, of participation, of value of human life. It is a mix of many things and it is just even little intangible things. Probably some of you have made that experience. I can assure that you will experience that if you spend some longer time outside of Europe, you will feel a European.