Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney connected with astronauts aboard the historic Artemis II mission Wednesday, honoring the nation’s first astronaut to journey around the moon during what has been a bright spot in sometimes tense U.S.-Canada relations under President Trump’s administration.
Royal Canadian Air Force Colonel Jeremy Hansen, age 50, has achieved the distinction of being the first international crew member on a lunar mission. Hansen is flying alongside three American astronauts on NASA’s Artemis II lunar flyby, which represents a crucial milestone in the space agency’s ambitious goal to land astronauts on the moon by 2028, competing with China’s lunar ambitions.
The crew’s 10-day journey is scheduled to conclude Friday when their capsule splashes down in waters off San Diego.
“Canadians couldn’t be more proud of you personally, both this mission and our collaboration with the United States,” Carney told Hansen during their conversation.
The prime minister also made a lighthearted comment about hoping the crew preferred maple syrup over Nutella on their morning pancakes, referencing a moment that went viral when cameras captured a floating jar of Nutella in the spacecraft’s zero-gravity environment. The maple leaf serves as Canada’s national emblem.
Hansen, who joined Canada’s astronaut program in 2009 and pledged to return with a Canadian flag from the mission, represents decades of cooperation between the U.S. and Canada in human space exploration. During the call, he discussed the importance of accepting risk both in space missions and broader endeavors.
“As a country, we have to be willing to have some failures,” Hansen said. “And we fail in this space program, but we just assure ourselves we’re not going to stay or rest in those failures. We’re going to push through them,” the astronaut explained while also answering questions from Canadian students.
This historic mission occurs during a period of strained trade relationships between the neighboring nations, following Trump’s implementation of tariffs on Canadian products and his repeated suggestions that Canada should become America’s 51st state. The groundbreaking lunar mission has provided a positive focal point for U.S. relations amid various international tensions involving strikes on Iran, trade disputes, and challenges to global institutions.
