John McFall, a medal-winning Paralympic athlete, has officially completed training with the European Space Agency and could become the first astronaut with a disability to visit the International Space Station.
Astronauts train like athletes so they can endure the rigours of space flight, including the forces of launch and re-entry, disorientation, muscle atrophy and other negative effects of living in space.
British-born McFall has done his own fair share of athletic training following the loss of his right leg in a motorcycle accident when he was 19. Wearing a prosthetic limb, he has won a long list of medals including the Paralympic Bronze Medal for 100-metre at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. McFall is also an orthopedic surgeon.
He applied to an open call by the European Space Agency (ESA) for astronauts in 2022, which was the first time in the history of human space flight that an agency allowed people with certain physical disabilities to make the cut. The space agency specifically wanted to test the feasibility of having astronauts with disabilities, and to learn more about the barriers that exist for them.
Out of 257 applicants with disabilities, McFall rose to the top, passing every stage of the process, and meeting all of the demanding psychological, cognitive, technical and professional requirements to get the job. He even flew on parabolic flights, and undertook winter sea and survival training missions.
He also went through some special testing, looking at how physiological changes caused by microgravity like fluid redistribution and muscle atrophy might affect how his prosthetic fits in space. While astronauts don’t typically need their legs much in orbit because they float freely in any direction — and manoeuvring on spacewalks is done with the hands, not the feet — the ESA recognized that he would still need the prosthetic for certain activities. The research team ultimately found no issues with this requirement.
Now, he has formally completed his astronaut training, and during a recent press conference ESA officials announced he is now on the waiting list for a spot to fly to the International Space Station. This would make him the first disabled person to reach orbit.
WATCH: ESA’s Fly! Project media briefing from Feb. 14, 2025
The situation reminds me of a science fiction novel that captured my imagination when I was a kid. Islands in the Sky by Arthur C. Clarke tells the tale of Roy Malcolm, a teenager who wins a trip up to a space station. There, he meets Commander Doyle, who runs the operation. Doyle had been working on the station for 10 years with no desire to return to Earth because on the ground he would be in a wheelchair. In space he is free to go anywhere, and because of his lack of lower limbs, can fit into smaller spaces other people can’t reach.
And while this was fiction, there has been research into the potential benefits of including people with disabilities into the astronaut corps. In the late 1950s, NASA recruited 11 deaf men — who came to be known as the Gallaudet 11 — to study their immunity to motion sickness and help shape the future of space flight exploration.
Today, initiatives like AstroAccess conduct microgravity missions, allowing people with disabilities the opportunity to experience weightlessness and conduct experiments on parabolic flights, with the goal of proving disabled astronauts have much to offer.
McFall is fortunate to be working through the ESA, which still advocates for diversity among its astronauts. As we’ve heard in recent weeks, NASA has been ordered to shut down its offices of diversity, equity, and inclusion by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration.
Everyone should be able to imagine the freedom of flying in zero gravity — and space exploration is better off for having a wide variety of perspectives, skills, experiences, and abilities included.
