French Astronaut Thomas Pesquet was able to accomplish something truly unique aboard the International Space Station recently. Despite being hundreds of miles away from his home country, Pesquet was able to cast his vote in the French election with the help of a friend as France goes through one of its most turbulent election in modern times.

It just goes to show that Pesquet has a strong sense of civic pride as well as a sense of duty. Pesquet, who is the youngest ESA astronaut, also faced the additional obstacle of the fact that his place of residence is in Frankfurt, Germany — not now, obviously, but that’s where his home is on Earth.

So he needed the help of a colleague in France to vote in the first round of the French elections on April 23. Pesquet gave power of attorney to his colleague to vote on his behalf while he circled the Earth 249 miles above the ground.

Pesquet described himself as a passionate follower of the election who has been open on his political preferences. He once remarked, “we must not judge candidates on the color of their tie but really on what they propose and what they will do,” according to Tech Times.

He also said in an interview with Franceinfo that it’s “important to open up and understand that the world is done with others, not against others, that we need more bridges than walls,” suggesting that he is not supportive of anti-immigration far-right candidate Marine Le Pen.

Pesquet is part of a six month mission that begin in November in 2016, and he works closely with astronauts Oleg Novitsky and NASA’s Peggy Whitson.

Marine Le Pen will face off against heavily favored moderate candidate Emmanuel Macron later this year.

Here is NASA’s posted biography of Pesquet.

Born in Rouen, France, on 27 February 1978, Thomas Pesquet is a black belt in judo and enjoys basketball, jogging, swimming, squash and outdoor sports such as mountain biking, kite surfing, sailing, skiing and mountaineering. He also has extensive experience in scuba diving and skydiving. His other interests include travelling, playing the saxophone and reading.

Education

Thomas graduated from the competitive French “classes préparatoires aux grandes écoles” at the Lycée Pierre Corneille in Rouen, France, in 1998.

In 2001, he received a master’s degree from the École Nationale Supérieure de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace in Toulouse, France, majoring in spacecraft design and control. He spent his final year before graduation at the École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada, as an exchange student on the Aeronautics and Space Master course.

Thomas graduated from the Air France flight school in 2006. This led to an Air Transport Pilot License-Instrument Rating (ATPL-IR).

Organisations

Thomas is a member of the French Aeronautics and Astronautics Association (3AF) and of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).

Experience

From April to September 2001, Thomas was a trainee engineer with Thales Alenia Space in Cannes, France, where he developed a satellite system design tool using concurrent engineering techniques.

From October 2001, he worked as a spacecraft dynamics engineer on remote sensing missions for GMV S.A. in Madrid, Spain.

Between 2002 and 2004, Thomas worked at the French space agency, CNES, as a research engineer on space mission autonomy. He also carried out studies on future European ground segment design and European space technology harmonisation. From late 2002, he was a CNES representative at the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems, working on cross-support between international space agencies.

An avid private pilot in his spare time, Thomas was selected in 2004 for Air France’s flight training programme. He went on to become a commercial pilot for the airline, where he started flying the Airbus A320 in 2006. Having logged more than 2300 flight hours on commercial airliners, he became a type rating instructor on the A320 and a Crew Resource Management instructor.

Thomas was selected as an ESA astronaut in May 2009. He joined ESA in September 2009 and completed basic training in November 2010. After graduation, he worked as a Eurocom, communicating with astronauts during spaceflights from the mission control centre. He was also in charge of future projects at the European Astronaut Centre, including initiating cooperation with new partners such as China.

To be ready for a space mission, he received further technical and operational training in Europe, Russia and the USA: on the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, on the US and Russian spacesuits, and on Space Station systems. He took part in exploration training courses: living and working underground on ESA’s CAVES training course in 2011, and underwater on NASA’s Seatest-2 mission.

On 17 March 2014, Thomas was assigned to a long-duration mission on the International Space Station.

Spaceflight experience

Thomas was launched to the International Space Station on 17 November 2016 for his six-month Proxima mission as a flight engineer for Expeditions 50 and 51. His is scheduled to return to Earth in May 2017.