He was selected in 1978 in the first group of astronauts of the European Space Agency (ESA), then was detached to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, for full training as Mission Specialist on the US Space Shuttle, following an agreement between ESA and NASA. After several years of training and various jobs at JSC, he served as a crewmember on four Shuttle missions, including two on-orbit interventions on the Hubble Space Telescope. During his last mission, he performed a spacewalk of more than 8 hours duration to install new equipment on the orbiting observatory. He spent more than 1000 hours in space during these four missions. He is currently a member of Space Innovation in Lausanne, Switzerland, and honorary Professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology.
Speaker
Prof Claude Nicollier
Member of Space Innovation/Federal Commission for Space Affairs
