Canada’s two newest astronauts, Jenni Sidey-Gibbons and Joshua Kutryk, graduate today from NASA’s astronaut basic training, making them officially eligible for space flight — and to possibly become the first Canadians on the moon.

Canadian Space Agency astronauts Sidey-Gibbons, who is from Calgary, and Kutryk, who is from Fort Saskatchewan, Alta., have spent two years in Houston with 11 NASA astronaut candidates training in NASA’s Artemis program. The program aims to return astronauts to the moon by 2024 and to be a stepping stone for sending humans to Mars.

The students have been learning the skills they’d need to blast off and work in space, from operating robotics systems on the International Space Station to spacewalking to Russian language skills. Completion of the training means they become eligible for space flight, including assignments to the ISS, Artemis missions to the Moon and, ultimately, missions to Mars, NASA said.

The class was taught by Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen — the first Canadian ever to teach it.

In a video produced by the CSA, both new astronauts share their dreams of going to the moon. 

“Just the thought of the day when we might see a Canadian flag on the moon is something that excites me like nothing else,” says Kutryk in the video. “That day is coming.”

Sidey-Gibbons and Kutryk were selected in 2017 as Canada’s first new astronauts since Hansen and David Saint-Jacques were hired in 2009. 

Sidey-Gibbons was previously an assistant professor in combustion in the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, and Kutryk was a Royal Canadian Air Force lieutenant-colonel.

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