An unshakable spaceman

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This article was published 26/09/2017 (3100 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield spent 166 days in space before hanging up his spacesuit in 2013, but he’d strap himself in for another blastoff if he had the chance.

“Depends on the trip,” said the 58-year-old, who takes the stage at the Burton Cummings Theatre tonight at 8 p.m. for an evening of galactic observations, musical interludes and a bit of post-Canada 150 flag-waving. “It depends how much money you have. Is going skiing in Banff for a week worth the price of flying from Winnipeg? For some people the answer would be yes.

“I think if you can get a spaceship that can get up to orbital speed, so it doesn’t just go up and fall back down again, but actually takes you around the planet… Those people are going to spend a lot of money, but they’re going to have an almost unprecedentally rare and rich human experience.

“(Orbiting the moon) would be one amazing week in the life and I would love to do that. That’s what I dreamed about as a nine-year-old kid and that set me on the path on all the things I’ve tried to do since.”

The dreams certainly came true for Hadfield.

He took part in three missions into Earth’s orbit — two on the space shuttles Atlantis (1995) and the Endeavour (2001) and another that led to a five-month stint as commander of the International Space Station in 2013.

But don’t soft-pedal Hadfield’s journey to get to his voyages in space. The pilot has flown more than 70 different types of aircraft while serving with Canada’s military and as a civilian test pilot. More than 5,300 Canadians applied to become new astronauts in 1992 and Hadfield was one of four selected (that group included soon-to-be Gov. Gen. Julie Payette). He trained all over the world and even in the sea for three years before finally rocketing into space in 1995 — and he continued training between missions.

“If you and I could somehow step into an elevator and when we got out we were on top of Mount Everest for three minutes and we took pictures of each other on top of Mount Everest… You would have been on top of Mount Everest but would you have experienced it? You would have missed almost everything,” Hadfield says in a telephone interview. “It’s the evolution and sculpting of who you are to become somebody more capable, to then be able to do those 10-year-old boy experiences that make life so much more rich.

“At the same time, I’m still the 10-year-old kid who’s just thrilled to have had a chance to do those things.”

Hadfield claimed worldwide fame when he added some art to his scientific life. During his mission aboard the International Space Station, he often wowed the world of social media with photographs of the planet from space, providing Earthlings with a view of their home that few could imagine.

“I’ve driven across the Prairies in an old Volkswagen in my 20s and then I’ve flown across Canada, stopping to get gas in Winnipeg as a fighter pilot. And I’ve soared across Canada in a spaceship hundreds of times and have seen the whole country in the matter of 10 minutes,” Hadfield says. “That combined perspective… that contrast in perspectives is an important one… It tends to minimize the differences and makes you look at what is shared.

“If you’re over Winnipeg and 20 minutes later you’re over Timbuktu and you look down, you realize they’re essentially the same. It becomes an immensely unifying thing to recognize from that vantage point, we’re in this together.”

Hadfield topped those orbital experiences off with musical performances — including his famous rendition of David Bowie’s Space Oddity — beamed back to Earth via satellite. He has added the musical twists to his Canada 150 presentations, but don’t expect him to get cold feet. The pressure of performing in front of people is nothing compared to the pressure of walking out into space, he says.

“Not at all, not even close,” he says with a chuckle. “We have an expression of dying onstage, but we don’t mean it.

“I spent almost my entire adult life trying to be competent enough that I could successfully be part of a crew that would get a spaceship to orbit and back and it’s dangerous and people die regularly… So no, the opportunity to get onstage, especially to help celebrate Canada’s 150th… it’s a really interesting moment to take a breath and look around and see how we got to where we are.”

alan.small@freepress.mb.ca Twitter:@AlanDSmall