Julie Payette
A lot of people, I think, would love to see the earth from above, wear a spacesuit. Certainly, when I was a kid, I wanted to wear a spacesuit.
My favourite thing about the holiday season is to spend time with family and friends and to take time off to celebrate.
My son, Laurier, and I love being outdoors. We like to ski and to skate, to play in the snow, and simply to walk and enjoy the winter scenery.
I am convinced that anyone can accomplish anything.
Trust science, believe that innovation and discoveries are good for us, and make decisions based on data and evidence.
We should continue all the time to look out for those who have less, to stand for those who can't, to reach out across differences, to use our land intelligently, to open our borders and welcome those who seek harbour, and never, ever cease to be curious, ask questions, and to explore and search.
It's been a great honour and privilege to serve Canadians.
We're all on-board the same planetary spaceship, but together, we can move mountains.
With our brains and our smarts and our altruistic capability, we can do a lot of good.
When you're a little different than others, it takes a little more time to fit in. If you really want to be there, there are no ingredients you need other than effort, perseverance and teamwork.Collection: Teamwork
Some people will always be volunteers to explore, and it is, in my mind, a privilege.Collection: People
You're always under the microscope, and you don't know which mission you're going to get. It's a surprise.Collection: Surprise
If anything, when you're up in space and you're inside a space ship, which is your home, and without which you would not survive, you know that Earth is your home. This is the only place you can return. In fact we're very meticulous. Part of our job is to maintain the spaceship. If we apply the same kind of model to Earth maybe we'd have a different outlook.Collection: Home
On the day a country decides not to invest a cent in innovation, discovery or exploration, that country decides to be a tributary to others.Collection: Country
When I saw the Earth from above, personally, as a spacecraft operator, it certainly reinforced and drove home the fact that there's one place where we can live right now. The seven billion of us are sharing a wonderful planet, and it's an absolute privilege to see it from above.Collection: Home
I think it's the entire privilege I had to represent my country. It's not the going to space alone; it's to be part of that endeavour and to contribute a very small part to a very important step toward pushing the frontier.Collection: Country
Almost everything I do when I approach an operational problem comes from the time I've been in space. It's a way of organizing your thoughts. We use problem-solving; what we call "what-if-ing." What if this happened? What would we do? We go over plan B, C, D, E, F, and whatever else, depending on the criticality of what we're doing. This kind of thing can be applied almost everywhere, even at home.Collection: Home
Definitely you don't become famous by doing something bad; that's a professional death sentence.Collection: Death Sentence
I really believe that, in 500 years, we will still remember the International Space Station, because it will have been the first time, really and truly, that nations put a lot of money, brains, resources, and effort together to build something peacefully, and to work together for the sole and unique purpose of furthering our knowledge and bringing it back to Earth for our mutual good.Collection: Believe
Will we go explore? Absolutely. That's what humans have been doing since we left the caves in Ethiopia. Why? Because this is part of our nature. We're curious. We want to push the envelope. That will never stop. We will see people on Mars, hopefully in our lifetime. My hope is that the endeavour is so large, so complex, so technically challenging, so demanding and so uplifting, that it will be done with a consortium of nations. I hope the people who do set foot on Mars will do so for all mankind, and not just one nation in particular.Collection: Uplifting
The prerequisite that people have a scientific or engineering degree or a medical degree limits the number of female astronauts. Right now, still, we have about 20 per cent of people who have that prerequisite who are female. So hey, girls: Embrace the very fun career of science and technology. Look at computer science. That's what I did.Collection: Girl
Most people here don't have a wide emotional range. It's just the type of people astronauts are, they're required to be level.Collection: Emotional
I'm 45, and I'm still at school, essentially. Even after being assigned to the mission, I had to write a number of exams, with people commenting on my performance.Collection: Writing
Definitely you don't become famous by doing something bad; that's a professional death sentence. You remember that whatever you do, someone will be watching, and you study all the time. It sounds terrible, but you get used to it. I'm 45, and I'm still at school, essentially.Collection: School
Nobody is going anywhere in 10 years.Collection: Years
The opportunities to become an astronaut in Canada were far and few.Collection: Opportunity
You're always under the microscope, you don't know which mission you're going to get. It's a surprise.Collection: Surprise
You're less apprehensive when you know what to expect. Also, the first flight is very important in this performance-driven culture I work in; it establishes your reputation. If you don't do well, it's probably your last flight.Collection: Important
My husband and I don't worry about each other the way we might if we didn't have similar jobs. I sometimes get an email where he tells me he's heading off on a mission to do terrain avoidance 50 feet above the ground at 500 knots. And I just say, "Okay, have a good flight."Collection: Jobs
Most astronauts are very down-to-earth people. Many of us, three-quarters, have an engineering degree, and we have a very Cartesian, rational approach to things. You don't go and get swept off your feet. That's not your job and that's not why you're hired. So if you get so mesmerized that you forget to do what you're supposed to do, whether it's to open the cargo door of the space shuttle or configure something inside, then you should not be there as a professional operator.Collection: People
I am definitely a little more nervous for my colleagues when I'm working at mission control than I am myself, on the shuttle.Collection: Littles
I always call myself a space construction worker. We were only the second mission ever to go to the space station. There was nothing on board. We brought the first three tons of equipment, including some of the Imax camera stuff. We literally switched the light on to the station and walked in. It was an assembly mission.Collection: Construction
The one thing we can't really train for is weightlessness, real weightlessness. It's a ton of fun. It's pure Newtonian physics. You push in one direction, you go in the opposite direction with an equal force.Collection: Fun
The science behind Interstellar is interesting, because some of it is absolutely real astrophysics and orbital mechanics, some of it is theoretical physics, and some of it is completely Hollywood. When a science fiction movie is based on plausible science, it's really good.Collection: Real