“I am absolutely delighted for Scott and Mikhail to receive that very well deserved honour.” Live from the International Space Station (ISS), the British Astronaut Tim Peake congratulated Scott Kelly (USA) and Mikhail Kornienko (RUS) on being awarded the FAI Komarov Diploma. Certainly a unique occasion to acknowledge his fellow crewmates! Peake’s congratulations came right after FAI’s Astronautic Records Commission (ICARE) President, Anu Ojha OBE, announced the attribution of the award during a live call with the astronaut from UK’s National Space Centre.

ICARE President Ojha, who is also Director of the UK’s National Space Academy programme and one of the Directors of the UK’s National Space Centre, lectured around 500 students and took the exclusive opportunity to call in astronaut Tim Peake live from space. Ojha thanked Peake for his inspirational work and the way he encourages young scientists and future engineers. During the conversation the Brit talked about his different experiments and experiences in space, before going into detail about his fascinating transition from aeronautics to astronautics.

Peake also shared his thoughts on the fact that his former crewmates from Expedition 46, Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko, have been awarded the FAI Komarov Diploma and how important their work is for future missions to the Moon, potentially Mars and even beyond. Both were awarded with this prestigious Diploma for their outstanding achievement in the field of human space exploration by providing significant advances in the detailed understanding of the medical effects of long-duration spaceflight in areas which need to be much further understood if humans are to venture on interplanetary exploration missions beyond earth.

Peake is the first British European Space Agency (ESA) Astronaut to live on ISS and the second Briton in space. He was launched to the ISS on 15 December 2015 for Expedition 46 and then transferred to Expedition 47, mostly conducting physic experiments, life science studies and spacewalks. Currently, Peake has been 5 months in space and is expected to land in the beginning of June.

See the video of the live discussion here: