Marc Garneau, first Canadian in space, remembered for aspirations he held for his country

Globe and Mail

21 hours ago

If there was ever a before-and-after moment in the life of Canada's first space traveller, it came on Oct. 5, 1984, about 25 minutes after the launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger.
By then the deafening roar of the engines had given way to a sudden silence. On board, Marc Garneau and his crewmates had unbuckled themselves from their seats and he was experiencing weightlessness for the first time.
But it was not until he floated over to a side hatch window that the import of the moment had its full effect.
'It wasn't a picture. I wasn't imagining it,' Mr. Garneau would later write in his autobiography, A Most Extraordinary Ride. 'I was floating high above Earth, looking down at my planet, a moment seared forever in my mind.'
It was also the moment that cemented Canada's role as a partner in human spaceflight. The contribution helped delineate the transition point between the U.S.-Soviet space race of the 1960s and 70s, and the more pluralistic era that followed, eventually leading to the construction of the International Space Station.
Mr. Garneau died on June 4 after a two-month battle with cancer, his family said. He was 76.
For more than two decades Mr. Garneau was the most visible symbol of Canada's space program, first as an astronaut and then as the president of the Canadian Space Agency. He would later take his signature grace-under-pressure style to Ottawa, where he served as a member of Parliament for 14½ years, including six years in the federal cabinet.
In every context, it was his blend of keen intelligence and commitment to public service that won him respect among both colleagues and rivals.
'It was never about him. It was about what Canada had allowed him to do – and he was so appreciative,' said Marc Roy, a political consultant and close friend who was Mr. Garneau's chief of staff when the latter was Canada's transport minister.
In addition to becoming the first Canadian astronaut to fly in space, Mr. Garneau was only the second non-American to do so on a NASA mission. In the process, he succeeded in proving himself as a team member alongside his U.S. counterparts while upholding his own national identity and purpose. It was a deft balance that set the standard for every Canadian astronaut since.
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'Mark really had to go and say, 'Hey guys, you can trust me and you can trust us,'' said Roberta Bondar, who would follow Mr. Garneau into orbit in 1992.
Both were among the original six members of Canada's astronaut corps, selected and unveiled to the public in December, 1983. Mr. Garneau, a naval officer and PhD engineer, was like a big brother in the group, Dr. Bondar said. Although he was younger than some of his colleagues, his military background had taught him how to be accessible and in the public eye without revealing too much.
To those who knew him, Mr. Garneau was a private person who was nevertheless warm and supportive to those around him, including other astronauts and their families.
He was unexcitable to a fault, a trait that was evident even during the punishing training sessions that Canada's first astronauts experienced together.
Dr. Bondar recalled one Friday night when Mr. Garneau had endured a particularly rough session of being hurled around in a Department of National Defence facility in Downsview, Ont. As he and other trainees were heading away in a van, Mr. Garneau asked the driver 'really nicely' to pull over so that he could throw up, Dr. Bondar said.
'And then he gets back in with a 'Thank you very much'. Polite to the end.'
But his calm demeanour and capacity for self-discipline took practice. In his autobiography, Mr. Garneau described teenage mischief and 'slip-ups' during his time as a naval cadet, including a foiled attempt to sneak off a ship unnoticed by swimming to shore.
Mr. Roy, who read the manuscript before publication, said it was Mr. Garneau's intention to reveal some of the more embarrassing moments of his youth.
'His goal was to say, 'I'm human, I erred, I straightened up. I'm no different than many people, and if that can serve as an example then that's a good thing,'' Mr. Roy said.
By Mr. Garneau's own description, he was a child of Canada's two solitudes. Born on Feb. 23, 1949, he was the second of the four sons of André Garneau, an infantry officer and Second World War veteran from Quebec City, and Jean Richardson, a nurse from New Brunswick.
'My father taught me how to be responsible. My mother taught me to dream of possibilities,' he wrote.
The family moved frequently because of his father's military career, and by the time he was 12 he had lived in seven different places in three countries. He spoke English at home but attended French school and became completely at ease in both languages.
Crossing the Atlantic to follow his father on his postings in West Germany and England whetted young Marc's interest in sailing. At 16, he enlisted in the Royal Canadian Navy.
He was sent to study engineering at the Saint-Jean Royal Military College. To many astronauts of his generation, the first moon landing, on July 20, 1969, was an indelible moment. That night, Mr. Garneau was on a sailboat, having crossed the Atlantic on a training course with other RMC classmates.
'I didn't think Canadians would ever fly into space,' Mr. Garneau told The Globe in a 2002 interview.
Yet the experience of being isolated on the ocean, in close quarters with a few others and far from help, provided the formative template that would later convince him he had the temperament to become an astronaut.
That realization came in June of 1983. By then he was married with twin children, and posted in Ottawa as a naval combat systems engineer. When he saw in a newspaper ad that the federal government was looking for astronauts – an opportunity made possible by the shuttle program's iconic Canadian-made robot arm – he was captivated.
'I could not shake the thought of being a pioneer,' Mr. Garneau said in his autobiography.
More than 4,300 people applied but he made it through successive cuts, despite one short-lived misunderstanding when poor penmanship on a reference letter had interviewers thinking that he had a 'regular drinking problem' rather than a 'regular training program' as his boss at National Defence Headquarters had written.
Radio transmissions were poor during his first space shuttle mission, designated STS-41-G. While on a call from U.S. president Ronald Reagan, he had trouble hearing but managed to catch the president saying something about 'three strong Canadian arms' so he correctly guessed it was about him and the robot arm and answered with words about the co-operation between the two countries.
During another orbital call, a press conference with the media, he couldn't recognize that the first question came from his brother Philippe, who was working for a Montreal radio station. One newspaper dubbed him 'The Right Stiff' because he hadn't acknowledged his own brother when he responded.
For the next seven years, he would be the only Canadian to have been to orbit after flights were paused because of the 1986 loss of the Challenger shuttle.
In his memoir, he revealed that, during that period, his wife, Jacqueline Garneau (née Brown), had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. They separated and she died of suicide in 1987. 'Few people wanted to talk openly about mental health in those days,' he wrote in his autobiography.
In the face of this personal tragedy, Mr. Garneau outwardly continued to project his trademark competence and focus.
Based with other astronauts in Houston, he returned to space in 1996, in the science-oriented STS-77 mission. It was an eventful year for Mr. Garneau, marked by his second space flight, the death of his elder brother Braun and the birth of a son, Adrien, from his second wife, Pamela Garneau (née Soame).
During his third and final mission, STS-97 in 2000, he operated the Canadarm to help install a massive metal truss that would hold solar panels powering the International Space Station.
'This was a particularly challenging manoeuvre,' said Michael Hiltz, mission operations department manager at MDA Space, the company based in Brampton, Ont., that builds the Canadarm. 'Marc's calm and steady hands were instrumental in the success of that mission.'
By then, Mr. Garneau had decided to return home and he took an executive post with the Canadian Space Agency, headquartered near Montreal.
In an interview with The Globe the following year, he said his return to Canada stemmed in part from a yearning for a more low-key outlook on life. 'We have a more reserved and liberal way of looking at things. Americans, certainly in the astronauts' crowd, are very, very patriotic,' he said.
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Soon after, he stepped into the role of president of the Canadian Space Agency, a key moment for the organization.
Gilles Leclerc, director of government and international affairs for the aerospace company Canadensys, was a member of Mr. Garneau's senior leadership team at that time.
He said he clearly remembers the agency's first all-staff meeting with Mr. Garneau, when he called on Canada to reach for Mars with its own planetary mission.
'It was bold,' Mr. Leclerc said. 'No one else could have just said that and be taken seriously.'
In the end, Mr. Garneau did not persuade the Canadian government to invest enough into the space program to undertake such a venture, but his focus on science set the stage for Canada's involvement in planetary missions and in NASA's larger goal of returning to the moon.
In late 2005, Mr. Garneau received an unexpected visit from two high-ranking federal Liberals, Hélène Scherrer and Dennis Dawson. Prime minister Paul Martin wanted to know if he would run for office.
Mr. Garneau left the CSA to be a Liberal candidate for Parliament. After losing in his bid for a seat in the 2006 election, he was elected in 2008, even though his party was defeated by the Conservatives.
In 2012, he considered running for the party leadership but withdrew and yielded to the eventual winner, Justin Trudeau. When the Liberals returned to power in 2015, Mr. Garneau became transport minister, remaining in the role until early 2021, when he was appointed foreign minister. However, he held that post for less than 10 months, then Mr. Trudeau dropped him after the October, 2021, election.
In March, 2023, he announced his exit from politics, citing a desire to be with his family. 'They would like me to be at home more often, to put it bluntly,' he told The Globe in an interview. 'I feel it's the right time.'
Robert Thirsk, a retired astronaut, physician and former chancellor at the University of Calgary who was the backup for Mr. Garneau during his first flight, said his colleague should be remembered for the aspirations he held for his country.
'Marc's dream was for a broader Canadian space program,' Dr. Thirsk said.
'A warm memory for me is a sailing trip we took years ago on Georgian Bay. From the deck of our boat at night, we gazed in wonder at the Milky Way, spotting constellations and the occasional satellite that passed overhead. Marc recounted what it was like to view our beautiful planet from orbit, and we shared our dreams about future exploratory missions to deep space.'
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