New standards for safety are now in place and Canada has helped provide tools and techniques that were needed. Technologies like these are innovative and represent great achievements for us.

You're in orbit over the Earth. And suddenly it's very, very quiet. It's dramatic. You realize you're floating in the straps in your chair. And you take off your seat belt and float over to the window and look out, and you realize, "I'm not looking at a picture, here." I couldn't process it all. Even if I forget everything else in my life, that will stay with me, burned into my brain until the day I die.

It is a challenge to have your launch date slip continuously.

I like the opportunity to travel the world and work in close company with other people.

What you aren't ready for being the first time in space - on an emotional and intellectual level - is how looking down at Earth will profoundly affect you. Over the long term, it has changed the way I think about planet Earth. When you go around the planet and look down, you think about the fact that this is the cradle of humanity, that this is a place where seven billion people, 200 countries, live side by side, that we share this place and there's nowhere else to go.

Canada's a huge country, so to be able to unite the country through communication satellite technology or to be able to observe it through remote sensing technology from space is a natural fit for a country like Canada.

We have played a critical role in meeting the new safety standards. The Canadian space industry contributed new tools that make the inspection of the space shuttle possible.