ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot is back in Europe after a record 237-day ISS mission

ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot is back in Europe. After splashdown with NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 on 8 October 2026, she arrived at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre in Cologne early on 10 October. ESA held a post-mission press conference in Cologne on 13 October.

Mission length

Adenot spent 237 days, 5 hours and 18 minutes in space on the εpsilon mission after launching on 13 February 2026. ESA says that is a new European record for the longest single spaceflight, beating Luca Parmitano’s Beyond mission by more than 35 days. Crew-12 is also the longest SpaceX Dragon mission to date, ahead of Crew-8’s 235 days.

Crew-12 undocked on 7 October at 12:05 GMT and splashed down in the Pacific on 8 October at 15:34 GMT after a 27-hour 29-minute return. Adenot flew with NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev.

Spacewalks and science

Adenot became the second European woman (after Samantha Cristoforetti) and the first French woman to perform an EVA. She completed three spacewalks in 14 days, totalling 19 hours 42 minutes outside the Station.

ESA reports roughly 218 hours on 35 European payloads, about 25 hours on Columbus systems work, and completion of all εpsilon-specific CNES experiments assigned to her. Work included health research, materials, biology, fluid and radiation physics, plus technology demos such as the European E4D exercise device and in-orbit metal 3D printing.

Outreach

During free time she reached more than 1.1 million social followers (over 403 million views of mission content) and more than 290,000 students via CNES Chloriss, AstroPi, ARISS and school live events.

Next steps

Adenot will spend two to three weeks readapting at DLR’s facility next to EAC before continuing rehab with the EAC training team. ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher linked the mission’s inspiration to Europe’s upcoming Intermediate Ministerial Council in Rome in December.