Jean-Loup Chretien French astronaut, brigadier general Date of Birth: 20.08.1938 Country: France

Biography of Jean-Loup Jacques Marie Chrétien

Jean-Loup Jacques Marie Chrétien (born August 20, 1938, La Rochelle) is a French astronaut and brigadier general. He is a Hero of the Soviet Union (1982) and the first French citizen to travel to space. Chrétien flew on the Soviet spacecraft Soyuz T-6 and the orbital station Soyuz-7 (June-July 1982), as well as on Soyuz TM-6 (launch) and Soyuz TM-7 (landing) and the Mir orbital complex (November-December 1988). He has been serving in the French Armed Forces since 1959 and graduated from the French Air Academy in 1961.

In December 1988, Jean-Loup Chrétien was promoted to the rank of general. From 1990 to 1993, he underwent training for flights on the Buran spacecraft and conducted training flights on the Tu-154 and MiG-25.

Chrétien's third space flight took place from September 25 to October 6, 1997, on the American space shuttle Atlantis as part of the STS-86 (Mir-NASA-7) program. In August 1998, at the age of 60, he applied to the US authorities to obtain American citizenship and be included in the NASA astronaut corps. After achieving his goal, Jean-Loup Chrétien worked at NASA. In September 2000, while visiting a Home Depot store in Texas, a 20 kg machine fell on him from a height of 4 meters. As a result of the injuries he sustained, he was retired in November 2001 and received monetary compensation from the store.

After his career in space, Jean-Loup Chrétien began working in the private sector as Vice President of Tietronix Software Inc. In 2002, he founded Tietronix Optics. He has been awarded the Order of Lenin, the Order of the Red Banner of Labour, and the French honors of Commander of the Legion of Honour and the Order of Merit. Chrétien is an honorary citizen of the Kazakh city of Arkalyk.