THE INTERVIEW

Jeremy Hansen's job is moon. One day, it might not just be trained astronauts like him up there.

- INTERVIEW BY KATIE UNDERWOOD • PHOTOGRAPHY BY RICHMOND LAM

IN JEREMY HANSEN’S OPINION, some of humanity’s stickiest problems are best solved from 380,000 kilometres away. As soon as T-minus two months from now, Hansen, a former air force pilot from London, Ontario, will squeeze his six-foot-two frame into NASA’s Orion capsule and head for the moon, becoming the first non-American astronaut in history to travel beyond low-Earth orbit. During the mission, dubbed Artemis II, the four-person crew will perform a figure-eight lunar flyby, along with rigorous tests to track the effects of space on the human body. That data will be quite handy quite soon. Hansen’s roughly 10-day excursion is just the second phase in NASA’s multi-step plan to build a habitable base on the moon—and yes, Elon, eventually get humans to Mars.

Still, no one’s going anywhere without Canada’s help. In addition to our growing collection of launchpads and cargo-rocket companies, the Canadian Space Agency is hard at work on Canadarm3, mulling over a lunar nuclear reactor and lending a hand with Gateway, a next-gen space station that'll orbit the moon—not to mention a kicky rover. But, given the chance, would Hansen leave Earth behind? Only temporarily.

You’ve been an astronaut in name since 2009, but you’ve never actually been to space. How does it feel now that, after some delays for heat-shield repairs, you’re finally about to blast off?

The feeling is: busy. Am I super-excited yet? Not really. I’m just focused on mission accomplishment. This is the first time we’ve put people on this rocket, so we're constantly trying to figure out what we could have missed. It'll feel like I’m going to space when the engines cut out and we're there.

Take me through some of your training exercises. You've been spending most of your time at the Lockheed Martin facility in Denver, correct?

Yep. In Houston, we have “emulators,” which are more akin to playing Microsoft