ESA astronaut portrait - Raphaël Liégeois

Raphaël Liégeois graduated together with his fellow ESA astronaut candidates Sophie Adenot, Rosemary Coogan, Pablo Álvarez Fernández and Marco Sieber and received astronaut certification at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre on 22 April 2024. This officially marks their transition into fully-fledged astronauts, ready and eligible for spaceflight. The group was selected in November 2022 and began their year-long basic astronaut training in April 2023. Basic astronaut training provides the candidates with overall familiarisation and training in various areas, such as spacecraft systems, spacewalking, flight engineering, robotics and life support systems, as well as survival and medical training. Following certification, the new astronauts will move on to the next phases of pre-assignment and mission-specific training, paving the way for future missions to the International Space Station and beyond.