 During STS-120, he participated in the Esperia mission for the European Space Agency.Paolo Nespoli served as first flight engineer for Expedition 26/27, Europe's third six-month mission to the International Space Station (ISS).On 15 December 2010 Nespoli flew aboard the Soyuz TMA-20 spacecraft from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan to the International Space Station with the Russian cosmonaut Dmitri Kondratyev and NASA's astronaut Catherine Coleman.