We've learned a lot by building the International Space Station, the good, the bad. But, the fact is is that working together as a team, unity aboard that space station, we can accomplish great things.
It's just this beautiful laboratory in space, and it's doing a lot of really cool things. So being up there and just being able to fly through that big station one more time and do some experiments while you're up there and get that view out of the cupola... priceless.
I think the crux of the matter was that if we were going to become partners in, for example, the International Space Station, we had to gain the respect of a country like the United States and particularly its space organization, NASA.
Manned spaceflight has lost its glamour - understandably so, because it hardly seems inspiring, 40 years after Apollo, for astronauts merely to circle the Earth in the space shuttle and the International Space Station.
In orbit, you're keyed up and aware of everything going on, every little noise, anything that may have special meaning because of where you are.
It's - I mean, the Olympics, what is it? It's an international competition to foster friendship and - and competition across - across the planet, and I think that's exactly what the International Space Station is.
I think there's going to be a very sudden shift in people's perception of the International Space Station, because suddenly it's going to look much, much bigger than it already is.
I lived at Star City for more than a year ahead of my trip to Mir on May 18, 1991 in Soyuz TM-12. My life at Star City was so remote that learning Russian became my greatest priority.
The Environmental Control and Life Support System (ECLSS), which controls the living environment on shuttles and on the International Space Station, doesn't have the luxury of disposal: discharging trash into space has long been judged a bad idea.
I think the International Space Station is providing a key bridge from us living on Earth to going somewhere into deep space.
I think both the space shuttle program and the International Space Station program have not really lived up to their expectations.
Through these ongoing activities and possibly in the future, a Canadian will go live and work on the International Space Station and we will continue to make Canadians proud of our achievements in space.
NASA will send up a big sun shade that will be in orbit between the earth and sun and deflect 2 or 3 percent of the sunshine back into space. It would be cheaper than the international space station.
Planets look about the same here as they do to you on the Earth because we really aren't that much closer. Our home, the International Space Station, orbits around the Earth at about 200 miles.
The current market cost for a space flight, about a week in space and about six people have gone with the Russians so far to the International Space Station; it costs about $30 to $35 million. So, it's not for the faint of heart. But our own market studies that we've commissioned as well as some public market studies all indicate that there are somewhere around 20 or so individuals every year who have both the means and the interest to do this. So, the market is definitely out there.
I think that my career and perhaps me being on the International Space Station can really show women and girls and everybody that hey, we're not just sitting at the table, we're leading the table.
The view from space is really very special. From the window, you can look back at the Earth and see the stars around you. I just hope that more people from Britain get the chance to experience it.
Welcome to President Bush, Mrs. Bush, and my fellow astronauts.
Canada has made a strong commitment as a partner in the International Space Station and, like the other partners, wishes to see the assembly of this unique orbiting laboratory continue.
Finally my dream came true in that there was a possibility that I could travel to the International Space Station. I've gone through the medicals and the training and now I'm officially, by the Russian Space Federation, a cosmonaut in training.
Our goal is to tell people about the International Space Station. I think very rarely people look up 250 miles and think, What are those guys working on, what are those men and women doing at this moment... They're living and doing regular things, but also doing incredible work as well. We really want to bring that to people.
I don't think people have an appreciation for the work that it takes to pull these missions off, like humans living on the space station continuously for 15 years. It is a huge army of hard-working people to make it happen.
We certainly would not be here, living and working on the International Space Station without the commitment and dedication of all the folks who worked the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo Programs as well as the Russian Space Program.
I've been so lucky to have done two spacewalks. If you looked at your wristwatch, I was outside about 15 hours, which is about 10 times around the world. And, you know, there's a whole time dilation, distortion thing.
NASA is developing space taxis to shuttle astronauts to the International Space Station. And just like New York taxis, they're all going to be driven by aliens.
