On 16 June 1963, aboard Vostok 6, Soviet Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to travel into space. We wanted to celebrate this date with a special event :“Stories of Women in Space”.

The event started at 19.00 with an introduction by A. Sgambati, WIA-E Bremen local group coordinator, about the story of Valentina, focusing the speech on her life as woman and as cosmonaut and how the space changed her life and destiny; including her announcement in 2013 to be one of the first human to go on a one-way trip to Mars if the opportunity arose.

Three special guests were on the stage:

• Dr. Marco Berg, head of the human spaceflight department at OHB, who presented 4 personal stories in relation to female astronauts on the ISS over more than 100 sessions support in Columbus.
• Anna Metz, one of the candidates of the “Die Astronautin” initiative. Anna tell us her motivation in joining the initiative and the special feeling experienced during this unique opportunity. She also tell us about the low women presence at German university in scientific field and how this initiative can also improve this aspect.
• Alev Somnez, Co-Founder of LunarVis start-up one of the winner of the ESA challenges. He presented the company concept of solar power production on the Moon to generate the power for laser power transmission to various spacecraft. Alev’s team is looking for a new member and a woman is more than welcome.

Later, each participant prepared a typical dish of the original country; therefore the evening ended with talks enjoying international food and fresh space cocktail.