About Paolo Nespoli
Major Paolo Angelo Nespoli is an Italian astronaut and engineer of the European Space Agency (ESA). In 2007, he first traveled into space aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery as a mission specialist of STS-120. In December 2010 he again traveled into space aboard the Soyuz TMA-20 spacecraft as an Expedition 26/27 flight engineer. Nespoli's third spaceflight was on board Soyuz MS-05, which launched in July 2017 for Expedition 52/53. He was also the European Space Agency's oldest active astronaut prior to his retirement in 2019. Paolo Nespoli served as first flight engineer for Expedition 26/27, Europe's third six-month mission to the International Space Station (ISS). In early January, Nespoli filmed the majority of the footage for the 2011 documentary film First Orbit, and as a result is credited as its director of photography. As Paolo left the ISS on 23 May 2011 in the Soyuz TMA-20 he was able to take the first pictures of a Space Shuttle docked with the ISS from the perspective of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.