I'm A Rocket Man: Astronaut Dave Williams

Dave Williams

Date Posted: 09/19/07

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My dreams of space travel started when I was about seven years old. I always thought, "Wow, what an incredible job!" I spent most of the 60s watching the Gemini Apollo program on television, listening to Walter Cronkite, and of course, witnessing the absolutely spectacular Apollo 11 mission in August of '69. Never during that time that I was dreaming of being an astronaut did I ever really think it was possible, because in those days, while Canada was the third country in the world to launch satellites, we didn't have a human space program, so I dreamt of being an aquanaut instead, living and working under water. I thought I'd be able to pull that one off more easily. Little did I know my childhood dream would come true. I returned from my second space expedition August 21, 2007.

As a kid, when my parents would buy a washing machine or a fridge, I'd take the cardboard box it came in and turn it into an imaginary spacecraft, complete with buttons, knobs and dials. That's part of being a kid - dreaming about the possibility to explore.

For me, exploration represents a quest for knowledge and the innate curiosity we all have. Whether it's working in research laboratories trying to understand how the human nervous system works, as in my case, or trying to unlock the cure for cancer, it's that inner drive to understand and seek solutions. There's always that sense of wondering what's on top of the mountain or across the valley at the end of the road. That sense of exploration is really what takes us to space or to the other final frontier, which is the ocean.

When I was an undergraduate at McGill University, I really enjoyed comparative physiology, comparing the physiology of different species, but also, the physiological adaptations that take place in humans working in extreme harsh environments - flying at high altitudes in an aircraft, living and working under water, scaling Mount Everest or flying into space.

I remember reading Arthur Guyton's textbook of physiology, and there was this chapter about the physiology of space flight. So, I was reading this in the 70s thinking, "Wow, wouldn't it be incredible to by a physician physiologist going into space to study how the body adapts and to be part of the research enabling humans to go farther into space and allow them to stay longer!"

I was one of four out of 5,300 applicants accepted into the astronaut training program back in 1992.