Canadian astronaut ready for NASA mission to International Space Station

HOUSTON – Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk said he’s been dreaming of going to space for a long time — and assuming everything goes to plan, he could fulfil that goal next week.

“I always dreamt of it and thought it would be the most wonderful experience,” Kutryk said on Thursday.

The 44-year-old is one of four people assigned to NASA’s SpaceX Crew 13 mission heading to the International Space Station.

The crew will spend six months at the station conducting experiments, doing research and taking part in critical maintenance work.

Kutryk is currently quarantining in Houston but will travel to Florida for the launch, which is set to take place next Thursday at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

It will finally fulfil a lifelong goal for the astronaut, who has seen a previous flight aboard the Boeing Starliner-1 cancelled in 2024. Next week’s launch was supposed to take place earlier this month but it was delayed to fix a leak on the spacecraft.

Kutryk said one of the most important skills for an astronaut is the ability to deal with constant change.

“Through it all, the priority has been being ready when called to go fly this mission for Canada,” he said. “And I think that we are.”

The space station is a long way from the cattle farm where Kutryk grew up in eastern Alberta. But he has sent a small piece of his family’s history with him in a cargo shipment already at the station — a pocket watch his relatives brought from Ukraine to Canada four generations ago.

“I think it would have been completely impossible for them to have any inkling of an imagination of where that watch could be 100 years later … going into space,” Kutryk said. “I think it’s just this really important personal memento, but also a really neat metaphor for how much the world can change because of technology, because of how we explore.”

Kutryk will be joined on the mission by NASA’s Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov. Kutryk said building trust among the team is critical to the success of the mission, which will confine the astronauts together in a small space for many months.

“We spend a lot of time together in situations that are designed deliberately to be stressful in that they will strain that relationship,” Kutryk said, adding that includes flying in high-performance jets and other expeditions.

It’s very important to demonstrate international collaboration at a time of geopolitical upheaval, Kutryk said. While the world may feel chaotic now, he said, space exploration can show people there is still a bright future ahead.

“One where countries are working together, not fighting. One where we’re looking after the world, not ruining it,” he said. “That’s the path and space helps us to do that.”

It’s been a high-profile few months for Canadian space exploration. Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen was part of the Artemis II mission that saw humanity return to the moon for the first time in more than 50 years.

Kutryk will be the fourth Canadian to take part in a long-duration mission to the International Space Station. Kutryk said he is proud to represent Canada and will be bringing Canadian flags with him on the journey.

The mission includes Canadian-led studies on how space travel and microgravity can affect human health. Kutryk said he feels lucky and grateful to be able to take part in that research.

Kutryk served as a CF-18 fighter pilot in Bagotville, Que., from 2007 to 2011, and was deployed to Libya and Afghanistan. He then worked as a test pilot in Cold Lake, Alta.

Kutryk’s experiences on the ground have prepared him for operational tasks in space, such as operating the Canadarm, the celebrated robotic system that was designed and built in Canada. And of course, he hopes to do some space walking.

“At the core of it, you’re operating really valuable, complicated technology in high-risk, high-consequence environments,” Kutryk said. “That’s what I’ve always enjoyed doing most in my career on Earth, and I think that’s what I look forward to the most in space.”

But like all the astronauts who came before him, Kutryk knows the first thing he’ll do when he gets to space is drift to the largest window he can find and take in the view.

“There is nothing that compares for how you change when you view the Earth from not being on the Earth,” he said.

“When you view it as this little blue perishable place where all of humanity has ever existed.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 24, 2026.

— By Kelly Geraldine Malone in Washington with files from Erika Morris in Montreal