Jeremy Hansen: I truly trust each and every single one of them. They’re very operationally competent. And, I feel really fortunate to be working on this mission with all of them.
I wanted to share a little bit with you about my fellow astronauts that I’m working with on the Artemis II mission.
I was assigned with Christina, Victor, and Reid, and since then, Jenni’s been assigned as my backup. And so all of us are working really closely together with a huge team of people to make Artemis II a reality.
I want to share a little bit about how I view my crewmates. Of course, these are people I have immense respect for. I truly trust each and every single one of them. They’re very operationally competent. But I wanted to give you some insights into how I see them as people to help you get to know them a little bit better.
So why don’t I start with Christina.
I really feel like her natural element is outdoors, exploring.
Visiting Kamestastin Crater with her on a geology expedition was really fun for me to get to see her in her element. And I really just feel like she’s at her best self out in nature, in the ruggedness of the wild. And she’s a true explorer.
Victor… We love to share stories about our military aviation experiences, but something that we really resonate on together is how we view our two nations working together. So I really appreciate the times when Victor and I just get to sit down and talk about the challenges in the world and how our countries can collaborate to help contribute in a positive way. And I really appreciate Victor’s viewpoints on those areas.
Reid Wiseman: Artemis I leads to Artemis II which leads to Artemis III when we hope to have humans on the surface of the Moon.
Jeremy Hansen: Reid is somebody that I’ve shared a lot of life with. Reid and I showed up here at the Johnson Space Center in 2009, went through astronaut candidate training together.
We’ve been through a lot of life, and he’s one of my best friends. It’s really cool to be assigned to this mission with somebody who I’m so close with personally and have such enormous respect for, and I really appreciate his leadership style and how he enables the whole crew to show up and contribute to that mission. Really special for me.Â
Jenni is someone that I’ve been getting to know since 2017 when she was brought into the Canadian Space Agency astronaut corps.
Something that’s kind of fun is my wife Catherine and I are godparents to Jenni and Chris’ two boys. And that’s really special to me.
Jenni is someone who’s extraordinarily operationally competent and, but also one of the kindest people you will ever meet.
It’s great to have her backing us up on this mission. And I’m excited about all the amazing things that Jenni is going to do in the future for Canada.
I feel really fortunate to be working on this mission with all of them.