Canada is a nation of explorers, and space exploration is just the next inevitable step.
Canada started exploring space in 1840.
Where now there is the University of Toronto, we built an observatory.
We were curious.
Why do all the compasses, point to Northern Canada?
And where do the Northern Lights come from?
When the Russians launched Sputnik, the whole world suddenly realized—we don’t have
to just look up.
We can go up.
...We should start trying to understand space directly.
And so starting in 1957, Canada started working on its own satellite.
We named our first satellite Alouette, and it launched in the early 60’s.
It made us the third country in the world in space.
After the Soviet Union with Sputnik, and then the Americans, and next came Canada.
It allowed us to deploy an antenna called the Storable Tubular Extendible Module, or
STEM, and it became a standard for all satellites, all around the world.
And when NASA started building the space shuttle, they needed someone to build a huge robot arm.
They hired those same brilliant people, to build the Canadarm.
It’s a beautifully elegant Canadian design that can grab onto satellites, and assemble
things together, and only takes about the same amount of electricity as one lightbulb.
Not only does it represent our country by the great work that it does, but right there
— printed on the side — is the word, “Canada”.
We built that Canadarm.
I was so lucky to be the very first Canadian to operate Canadarm.
It makes me smile just to think about it.
Canadarm flew in space a hundred times, it released the Hubble Telescope, and then grabbed
it again when we fixed it and improved it.
It helped build the Russian space station Mir.
And we are so respected for building space robots, that when it came time to build the
International Space Station and it needed a huge permanent space robot, Canada was trusted
to build the space station robot arm, Canadarm2.
It’s bigger, it’s more powerful, it has more joints.
It can walk all around the outside of the space station like an enormous centipede.
It becomes so important and iconic for Canada, that we represent that arm on our five dollar bill.
And so not only did Canada build the huge Canadarm for the space shuttle, and Canadarm2
for the space station, but we built Dexter—a dextrous manipulator that’s up on the space
station permanently.
And it has helped us build the space station, maintain the space station, but also do research.
Right across Canada It’s the brightest star in the sky.
After the sun, and then the moon, the next brightest thing up there is the International
Space Station.
Our huge robot arms, piece-by-piece, assembled this enormous human outpost that’s orbiting
our world.
Canadarm on the space shuttle would reach into the back, pull out this huge new piece
of space station, hold it up, and then Canadarm2 on the space station would reach down and
grab this piece—like a Canadian handshake in space—and then attach it.
Making the space station bigger and bigger and bigger over time.
It was a multi-decade project.
Julie Payette was our first Canadian on the International Space Station, when she was
helping to build it, right around the turn of the century.
And since then, Canadians have visited the space station, and lived on the space station,
and in my case, even commanded the International Space Station.
Canadian astronauts have been flying in space since almost the very beginning.
Bob Thirsk, Bjarni Tryggvason, Ken Money, and Roberta Bondar, and then the very first
Canadian who flew in space—Marc Garneau.
And with each step forward in invention and technology, Canada becomes more capable of
exploring the rest of the universe.
We are the world’s leading robot builder,
and it came purely from the legacy of what we already put into space—from our very
first satellite right through to Canada building space stations.
I’m Chris Hadfield, explorer of space, explorer of ideas - Exploration is Canada.