European Astronaut Centre

The European Astronaut Centre (EAC) is the European Space Agency's official center for astronaut selection, training, medical support, and operational preparation — located in Cologne, Germany adjacent to the German Aerospace Center (DLR) campus, founded in 1990 and staffed by over 100 professionals spanning flight surgeons, training instructors, engineers, physiologists, and mission specialists.

The EAC's primary function is preparing European astronauts for long-duration missions to the International Space Station (ISS) and future destinations including lunar Gateway and the Moon's surface. The training curriculum covers multiple domains: systems training for ISS modules (Columbus European laboratory, Node modules, Soyuz/Crew Dragon spacecraft), spacewalk (EVA) training in the EAC's 10-meter-deep neutral buoyancy pool (the Neutral Buoyancy Facility, NBF) where astronauts in pressure suits practice maintenance tasks and construction procedures in simulated microgravity conditions, robotics training for Canadarm2 and European Robotic Arm (ERA) operation, Russian language training (historically required for Soyuz operations), scientific experiment protocols, emergency procedures, survival training (sea/jungle/winter), and physical fitness.

The EAC also conducts ESA's astronaut selection campaigns — the most recent 2021-2022 campaign received over 22,500 applications from ESA member state citizens, the highest response rate in ESA's history, resulting in the selection of five career astronauts and 17 reserve astronauts. The selection process involves physical health screening, psychological assessment, cognitive testing, group dynamics exercises, and technical aptitude evaluation.

Medical support for European astronauts on orbit — monitoring crew health, coordinating with ISS flight surgeons, providing telemedicine consultations, and managing return-to-flight medical clearance — is a continuous EAC function during mission operations. Post-flight rehabilitation for astronauts returning from the physiological effects of microgravity (bone density loss, muscle atrophy, cardiovascular deconditioning, fluid redistribution) takes place partially at the EAC.

The EAC's location in Cologne also provides proximity to ESTEC (Netherlands), ESOC (Darmstadt), and ESA's European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC, Madrid), with coordinated training activities distributed across ESA facilities and partner agency training centers (NASA JSC, Roscosmos GCTC, JAXA Tsukuba).