Hello, everyone. I’m David Saint-Jacques, Canadian Space Agency astronaut.
Canada is going to the Moon.
Humanity is going back to the Moon after 50 years.
We’ve been living and working in space for a long time
aboard the Space Station for several decades,
but now we’re getting ready for the great adventure to go back to the Moon.
Before I talk about this a bit more,
let me introduce myself and talk about the space mission I’ve been on.
On December 3, 2018,
David Saint-Jacques had a dream come true.
He flew to the International Space Station for a six-and-a-half month mission in space.
When astronauts are quarantined before going to space,
what was once a dream begins to feel more and more real.
The launch on December 3 was a success!
David’s journey to the Space Station lasted six hours.
Once on board, a very busy schedule awaited the astronauts.
Welcome onboard the Space Station.
From conducting science experiments
to maintaining the Space Station,
working out every day,
and communicating with young Canadians all over the country,
performing a wide variety of tasks to ensure the success of the mission.
It is a very humbling privilege to be here.
Very, very few people have had that chance to see these views.
David had the chance to take part in a world first:
the test flight of the Crew Dragon spacecraft.
Farewell, Dragon! Farewell, Ripley.
On March 14, three new crewmates arrived on the Station.
On April 8, David Saint-Jacques conducted his first spacewalk.
Good morning, TC. Ready.
He was accompanied by NASA astronaut Anne McClain.
For six and a half hours, they carried out a number of tasks,
including connecting cables to provide an alternate power supply for Canadarm2.
David became the fourth Canadian Space Agency astronaut to perform a spacewalk.
We take time to look around us.
We take time to try to let it all sink in.
To be honest, I’m sure it will take weeks, months,
or maybe even years for the experience to really sink in.
He controlled Canadarm2 to capture SpaceX’s Dragon cargo ship.
Welcome onboard Dragon!
We were backing away, and we could see the Space Station
and the solar panels gradually receding.
I noticed movement.
We still had the impression that we weren’t moving, that we were floating.
It reminded me a bit, perhaps, of the impact one feels in a car crash.
It was a very abrupt stop.
The wave is very strong,
this enormous wave that brought me here.
It was quite a trip. I am completely blown away.
It is very touching and it is very humbling.
And it makes you want to go back to Earth and help make it better.
Like everybody else, my journey started towards my dream as a child,
a child full of imagination and a child who wanted to explore the universe around him,
and that’s been always my motivation to understand the world that I’m in.
I was recruited in 2009 and I moved to Houston, Texas to start astronaut training at NASA.
We learned a lot about using the spacesuit, using space station, understanding space science,
learning all the languages of the international space collaboration.
We travelled in the U.S., in Russia, in Canada, in Japan, in Europe,
all of that to become qualified astronauts.
It’s a fun but kind of prolonged process.
During my mission, I lived almost seven months onboard the International Space Station.
The Space Station is humanity’s spacecraft right now.
It is also a great place of research.
We conduct all -- thousands of experiments in many,
many different fields, but especially for Canada in the field of human health.
This is a great collaboration.
Also, it’s a tool of international collaboration, and it’s also our steppingstone
to learning to live for a long term in space with our dreams of going further into the cosmos.
While in space, I had the chance to use Canadarm2, Canada’s robot,
our contribution to the International Space Station.
It’s a giant robotic arm that was used to build the Space Station.
Every module was built in a different country,
hurled into space and carefully assembled with Canadarm2.
We also use it, as in this picture, to grab visiting vehicles.
These are cargo spacecraft that bring us food and supplies
and spare parts and we use the arm to kind of catch them and bring them to a docking port.
I also had the privilege of doing a spacewalk, donning on my spacesuit and going
outside the Space Station to perform some repairs.
It was a great privilege and it’s a really special moment for every astronaut
to have this change to be a little independent satellite of the world,
and I really felt the connection to the thousands of people on the ground
who had been working for decades to make this technological miracle possible.
Here I was, comfortable in my spacesuit in this impossibly dangerous environment,
just walking around, fixing my house.
On board the Space Station, when we’re not busy repairing life-support systems
or doing a spacewalk or using Canadarm, we do science.
We are both technicians and guinea pigs for scientific research.
We’ll do research on each other.
The reason why we do that is because going to space is fun and you’re floating,
and it’s amazing, but it’s really bad for you, and it’s bad in ways that resemble real disease,
except they develop really fast in otherwise super healthy individuals.
Therefore, we are great research subjects for medical research when we are in space.
And so in all these technologies and cures that we can figure out to help astronauts,
they all end up being useful on Earth.
I remember as a child seeing these images of the Earth seen from the Moon,
and when I understood what I was looking at, I really became obsessed with space exploration,
and it made me realize that somehow, the photographer had to not be on Earth
to take these photos, and it really spurred in me this idea that through technology,
we can explore and expand.
Well, we are going back to the Moon.
Humanity is going back and Canada is joining.
We are going to partner in NASA’s Artemis Program,
which will be a series of missions to the Moon.
We are also setting up the LEAP, the Lunar Exploration Accelerator Program,
to find innovative ideas and technologies to help us better contribute
to this great worldwide endeavour.
The Moon
The gravity on the Moon is 1/6 the gravity of Earth.
You weigh six times less on the Moon!
The distance between Earth and the Moon is 384,400 km.
Using current technology, it would take us three days to get there.
The Moon completes one orbit around Earth in 29.5 days.
Other than Earth, the Moon is the most explored celestial body in our solar system.
The first artificial object sent to the Moon was a Soviet probe called Luna 2.
It crashed onto the surface on September 14, 1959.
A Canadian astronaut is taking part in Artemis II...
...the first crewed mission to the Moon since 1972.
The Artemis Program will consist of Artemis missions - these are rocket rides -
and the Lunar Gateway.
The Gateway is a little space station orbiting the Moon.
It will serve as a base to missions to the Moon, also as a research laboratory,
a bit like the International Space Station does, and a bit of a control centre
for operations in the lunar environment.
Canada’s contribution to this new lunar program is Canadarm3.
That’s the third-generation Canadian space robot that will be on Gateway
and be used to support astronauts doing spacewalks, to relocate modules if needed,
and it can also be used to perform autonomous repairs.
That is a very novel idea.
Gateway will, most of the time, not be crewed, and the only crew will be Canadarm3.
It will be there, ready to perform repairs as needed.
In exchange for contributing Canadarm3 to the Lunar Gateway,
Canada will get two things: opportunity to perform science in Gateway and on the Moon,
but also flights to the lunar environment.
These are the Artemis missions.
Artemis 1 mission will be uncrewed, just sending the rocket around the Moon,
make sure everything works.
That should happen soon, in a few months, in 2022.
The Artemis 2 mission is a big deal.
It’s the first time in 50 years that we will send humans away from the shores of Earth,
away from low Earth orbit and around the Moon.
And guess what? There will be a Canadian on board.
Artemis 3 missions and further on will go to the Lunar Gateway and perhaps,
ultimately, to the surface of the Moon,
and these will include the first woman and the first person of colour going to the Moon.
The Artemis 1 mission is really exciting and it’s just around the corner,
somewhere during the summer of 2022.
Here is the SLS rocket on top of which sits the Orion spacecraft.
We will send an empty spacecraft, maybe with crash-test dummies - I don’t know -
but no real crew, on a mission to the Moon.
It will orbit the Moon for several days.
We’ll conduct all sorts of tests, and then it will come back to Earth and splash down
just like the real spacecraft will do with people.
This will allow us to test end to end all the systems
and reassure ourselves for the next step.
Launch from Kennedy Space Center
Separation of solid rocket boosters
Deployment of solar arrays
Outbound flight
Flight in lunar orbit
Return to Earth
Re-entry into atmosphere
Deployment of parachutes
Splashdown in the Pacific Ocean
The next step, of course, is to send humans to the lunar environment.
On the Artemis 2 mission, people will go around the Moon and come back to Earth,
a bit like - space history buffs would know - we did for the Apollo 8 mission,
and one of us, one of the Canadian astronauts will be on that mission. It’s really exciting.
Then there will be missions to the Gateway that will follow,
where we’ll go to Gateway, and from Gateway, go to the Moon.
That is also a great opportunity for Canadians to participate.
When we go back to the Moon, we’ll be there to do science.
First, we will study the geology of the Moon.
We will also study how we can use resources on the Moon.
Specifically, we believe there’s ice from which we can make water,
from which we can make oxygen and fuel - can you believe it - for our systems.
So this is going to be really exciting missions to help us figure out
how to eventually establish a base on the Moon.
One of the things we’ll be looking for on the Moon is ice.
There is ice on the Moon, but it lives in the recessed corners of dark craters,
where there’s very rarely sunlight,
and Canada is going to send a rover to explore and look for ice.
This rover will be part of our contribution to the Moon exploration program.
It will be able to operate in the lunar nights and terribly cold temperatures,
and it’s going to be the next level in lunar exploration technology.
Human space flight is all about humans going into space,
and one of the big challenges that astronauts will face during these missions to the Moon
and eventually to Mars is to stay healthy and active while they’re so far away from help.
Through an initiative called Health Beyond,
the Canadian Space Agency is looking at ways that we can improve
the way medical services are offered to astronauts
and, at the same time, use all that new technology on Earth
because the needs of an astronaut on a deep-space mission
are very similar to the needs of someone on Earth who lives in, for example,
a rural area or has difficulty going to the clinic.
Anybody who is sort of far from medical help will benefit from these technologies.
Another important challenge that will be faced by crews
going on these deep-space missions is food.
We can’t afford to just bring all the food we need like we do right now
on the International Space Station.
We’ll need to grow our own food in these super austere environments of deep-space exploration.
That’s why the CSA, through the Deep-Space Food Challenge,
is looking into ways to grow food in these austere places.
And guess what? Of course what we learn about that for space
can be used on Earth here and make food grow in places that otherwise
As you can see, humanity is progressing in our ambitions to explore space.
We spend a lot of time in lower Earth orbit on International Space Station.
This is a bit like trying our camping gear in the backyard of our home.
If things go bad, you can always go inside the house.
We’re now going back to the Moon after 50 years’ absence
through the Lunar Gateway and the Artemis missions.
Everything we’ve learned on the International Space Station will allow us to safely go back
to the Moon and live in the lunar environment.
That’s a bit like taking our camping gear and going on top of a nearby mountain,
an hour’s drive away from home.
You can still come back perhaps if you have a problem.
All of this leads to the very ambitious goal of going to Mars one day.
Mars is a thousand times further away than the Moon.
It’s a completely different order of magnitude.
That’s like taking our camping gear that we’ve tested in our backyard
and our nearby mountain, and then going to Everest with it.
We’ve passed the point of no return.
We really have to be ready and autonomous for the mission.
This is a real big dream for the next generation of Canadians.
These are really exciting times for Canadians in space exploration.
For Canadian industry to participate in these bold new ambitious missions,
first back to the Moon and eventually to Mars, and also for young Canadians to have that dream.
Because I have a secret for you.
The first people that will land on Mars one day, I think they’re born, but they’re still children.
Bye bye.