ESA welcomes parastronauts: In space we're all disabled As part of a selection process for new astronauts, the European Space Agency is recruiting individuals with disabilities to be a parastronaut, with the hopes of eventually heading to space. The European Space Agency (ESA) announced this week that it will be looking for a physically disabled candidate as one of its new astronauts selected during the 2021-2022 recruitment cycle. "We all witness people with various disabilities or let's say differently-abled people taking their place in society: in politics, on our TV screens. We've all marveled at the Paralympians," said David Parker, Director of Human and Robotic Exploration at ESA. "We already have people working at ESA who have disabilities, and we need more of them to join us."