ISTANBUL (AP) — Turkey’s first astronaut returned residence to a hero’s welcome Monday, portrayed as an emblem of the nation’s advances in expertise and aerospace.
Alper Gezeravci was greeted by bouquet-laden youngsters at Ankara’s Esenboga Airport as he returned from a non-public three-week mission to the Worldwide House Station. In return, he handed out Turkish flags he had carried with him into area.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has intently adopted Gezeravci’s mission, declaring it a “new image of a rising, stronger and assertive Turkey,” after the nation marked its centenary final yr.
Erdogan has spoken a number of instances to Gezeravci, a 44-year-old former Turkish fighter pilot, since he left for Florida to arrange for the mission.
His area flight, for which Turkey paid roughly $55 million, was the third such journey organized by Houston-based Axiom House with NASA and SpaceX.
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The expedition is seen in Turkey as a supply of nationwide delight and a spotlight of its technological development, particularly within the area of aerospace and army improvement comparable to aerial drones.
Addressing journalists at Esenboga in entrance of a backdrop proclaiming “Turkey’s First Manned House Mission,” Trade and Expertise Minister Mehmet Fatih Kacir mentioned the mission was “a primary, but it surely is not going to be the final. A brand new web page has been opened in area science and applied sciences for Turkey.”
Turkey established its personal area company in 2018, and mentioned it should land on the moon by 2026.
Gezeravci was joined on the journey by Italian air drive Col. Walter Villadei and Sweden’s Marcus Wandt, a former fighter pilot. They had been escorted by retired NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria, who now works for Axiom House.
The crew returned in a SpaceX capsule that parachuted into the Atlantic off the Florida coast on Friday.
Whereas in orbit, the astronauts carried out science experiments and chatted with schoolchildren and officers from their nations. They loved a number of additional days on the area station, ready for the climate to enhance within the splashdown zone.
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