The AXE Apollo Team Philippines met with a number of other astronaut hopefuls from more than 60 countries at the AXE Apollo Space Academy (AASA) Space Camp inside the famed Kennedy Space Center in Orlando, Florida, USA.

Filipinos Evan Ray Datuin, Chino Roque and Ramil Santos gamely exchanged stories with some of the 104 AASA Space Camp candidates on how they were selected and trained for the Space Camp during an evening briefing at the at the space center’s Rocket Garden that had Mercury-Redstone, Atlas and Titan rockets as spectacular backdrops.

The highly competitive field of astronaut aspirants comes from the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Germany, France, Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, South Africa, India, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, China, Vietnam, New Zealand, Taiwan and other countries.

Divided into six groups—Apollo, Enterprise, Genesis, Discovery, Hubble and Atlantis—the 107 astronaut candidates will undergo intense physical and mental training that will employ the same methods and equipment used to hone the skills of astronauts from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

These include AXE Space Academy Zero Gravity Training via parabolic flights onboard a modified Boeing 727 that will simulate the feeling of complete weightlessness, Air Combat Training onboard a SIAI Marchetti SF260 to engage in multiple “G-Pulling” and various tactical flight maneuvers and G Force Training where astronaut aspirants will suit up, strap in, and blast off into an interactive experience that will give them the feeling of being in space and the pressure of four times the force of gravity.