Brit Paralympian to become first ever disabled astronaut
Paris: The European Space Agency (ESA) yesterday unveiled their astronaut class of 2022 at their summit in Paris, including five career astronauts, 11 members of the astronaut reserve and, notably, the first ever disabled astronaut.
ESA received a record number of applications to join this year’s class of potential space-goers, with more than 22,000 hopefuls applying to be part of the programme.
Amongst the successful applicants, John McFall, from Frimley, Surrey, has become the world’s first disabled astronaut. The 41-year-old lost his right leg in a motorcycle accident when he was 19, going on to represent Great Britain in the Paralympic Games.
McFall will join this year’s programme as its first ever para-astronaut and could potentially become the first person with a disability to go to space. He will take part in a feasibility project being run by ESA to explore and “identify potential adaptations to eventually enable an astronaut with a physical disability to fly to space”.
He told the BBC he felt “compelled” to apply when he saw the opportunity:
“When ESA announced that they were looking for candidates with a physical disability to run this astronaut feasibility project, I looked at the person specification and it just kind of jumped out to me, I felt so inspired by it.”
He hopes to be able to inspire others and is looking forward to the opportunity to help answer the “very aspirational question: can we get someone with a physical disability into space, to work in space safe
ly?”.