Léopold Eyharts
| Léopold Eyharts | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Country: |
 France
|
| Organization: |
CNES / ESA
|
| selected on | February 1, 1990 (3rd CNES group) |
| Calls: | 2 space flights |
| Start of the first space flight: |
January 29, 1998 |
| Landing of the last space flight: |
March 27, 2008 |
| Time in space: | 68d 20h 30min |
| retired on | 1st May 2017 |
| Space flights | |
|
|
Léopold Eyharts (born April 28, 1957 in Biarritz , Pyrénées-Atlantiques , France ) is a former French spaceman .
biography
Eyharts grew up in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department in southwest France, not far from the border with Spain . He wanted to become a pilot and therefore joined the French Air Force AdlA (Army de l'Air) in the mid-1970s. From 1977 he attended the Air Force Academy EA ( École de l'air ) in Salon-de-Provence ( Département Bouches-du-Rhône ). He studied aeronautical engineering and graduated from flight school in 1979. This was followed by a one-year advanced course to become a fighter pilot in Tours ( Département Indre-et-Loire ).
Eyharts was appointed head of the 7th Fighter Squadron, which is stationed at the Istres air base in the Bouches-du-Rhône department and equipped with Jaguar fighter-bombers . In 1985 he was promoted and appointed commandant of the base in Saint-Dizier ( Haute-Marne department ). After two years of “office work”, he returned to Istres and trained at the French EPNER test pilot school (École du Personnel Navigant d'Essais et de Réception). In 1988 he received his test pilot diploma and was transferred to the flight test center at the military airfield Brétigny-sur-Orge near Paris . Two years later he was promoted to chief test pilot.
Astronaut activity
At the end of the 1980s, Eyharts applied to the French space agency CNES ( Center National d'Études Spatiales ) as a space traveler (French: Spationaut). Together with Philippe Perrin, Jean-Marc Gasparini and Benoit Silve, Eyharts was selected in February 1990 with the third CNES group. He first came to Toulouse ( Haute-Garonne Department ) to work on the development of the planned European space shuttle Hermes .
In July 1990, Air Force Major Eyharts was one of the six candidates that the CNES proposed to the then Soviet space agency Glawkosmos as possible research cosmonauts for a mission to the Mir space station in 1992. Although he was not taken into account, he took part in two short training courses in Russia: in 1991 for six weeks in Star City near Moscow and in May 1993 in a two-week survival training course. He was also trained in handling the Russian space shuttle Buran at the end of 1992 .
When the European space agency ESA selected its second squad in the spring of 1992, Eyharts was passed over. In the meantime, the CNES used him as a test pilot for the Caravelle , with which parabolic flights were carried out. In 1994 he was in charge of test flights for the Caravelle's successor, the Airbus A300 .
In mid-July 1994 Claudie André-Deshays and Léopold Eyharts were nominated for the Franco-Russian Mir-Cassiopée mission on board the Mir. In December it was decided that André-Deshays would take the Soyuz TM-24 flight in August 1996 and Eyharts would be her substitute. The one and a half year training started in January 1995. The first ten months consisted mainly of theoretical lessons, the last eight of practical courses.
In December 1996, Lieutenant Colonel Eyharts was awarded the contract for his first space flight. The Franco-Russian cooperation was called Mir-Pégase and was the successor to “Cassiopée”. Together with Talghat Mussabajew and Nikolai Budarin , Eyharts set off with Soyuz TM-27 in late January 1998 . After three weeks of research - Eyharts examined the effects of weightlessness on half a dozen ribbed newts - he returned to Earth while his Russian colleagues worked on board the Mir station for six months.
In August 1998, Colonel Léopold Eyharts joined the newly formed European astronaut corps . ESA sent him together with the German Hans Schlegel and the two Italians Paolo Nespoli and Roberto Vittori for further training in the USA. They strengthened 17 astronaut group of NASA and were at the Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston ( Texas two years trained as mission specialists long). Eyharts then headed the software systems and information technology department of the International Space Station (ISS) at JSC .
From April 2001, Eyharts and several other astronauts received further training on ISS components. This included getting to know the assemblies from the respective manufacturers. At first they stayed in the USA. In December 2001, the astronauts traveled to Japan for two months to familiarize themselves with the Kibō module. At the end of August 2002, a two-week training course followed in Cologne at the ESA's European Astronaut Center.
From October 2004 Eyharts trained as Thomas Reiter's substitute for the first long-term stay of a Western European on board the ISS. Reiter was brought to the ISS on the STS-121 shuttle mission and worked there from July to December 2006. In 2007, Eyharts was promoted to Brigadier General.
Eyharts was the next Western European on the space station after Reiter, but for a shorter stay. Eyharts left for the ISS on February 7, 2008 with STS-122 and returned a month and a half later on March 27 with STS-123 .
Private
Eyharts is married and has one child.
See also
Web links
- Short biography of Léopold Eyharts at spacefacts.de
- ESA biography of Léopold Eyharts (English)
- Biography of Léopold Eyharts in the Encyclopedia Astronautica (English)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Eyharts, Leopold |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | French spaceman |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 28, 1957 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Biarritz ( France ) |