CALGARY — Alberta-born astronaut Joshua Kutryk has officially left Earth, blasting off Thursday morning on his first mission to space.Kutryk launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket shortly after 11 a.m. ET on Thursday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, beginning a roughly six-month mission aboard the International Space Station.The successful launch sent SpaceX's Crew-13 into orbit with Kutryk alongside NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov.The crew is travelling aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule and is expected to reach the International Space Station approximately eight hours after liftoff.The six-month journey will see the spacecraft attempt one of the fastest crewed trips to the orbiting laboratory. For Kutryk, the launch marks the end of a long wait to make his first trip beyond Earth.The 44-year-old Canadian Space Agency astronaut was born in Fort Saskatchewan and grew up on prairie farmland in eastern Alberta. Before becoming an astronaut, he served as a CF-18 fighter pilot and experimental test pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force..Kutryk was selected to Canada's astronaut corps in 2017 and has since trained in Houston and worked in several technical and operational roles, including supporting spacewalks and spacecraft operations from Mission Control.He has logged more than 4,000 flight hours across more than 40 types of aircraft.Thursday's launch also marks a first for Canada's space program.Kutryk is the first Canadian Space Agency astronaut to fly under NASA's Commercial Crew Program, which uses privately developed spacecraft to transport astronauts to and from the International Space Station.He will become the fourth CSA astronaut to participate in a long-duration mission aboard the ISS, following Robert Thirsk, Chris Hadfield and David Saint-Jacques.Once aboard, Kutryk will join Expedition 75 and spend approximately six months living and working on the station. His work will include scientific experiments, testing new technologies and research intended to better understand the effects of long-duration spaceflight on the human body..Kutryk also has a piece of Alberta family history waiting for him in orbit.A century-old pocket watch belonging to his family was sent to the space station ahead of his arrival. The heirloom traces back to his ancestors, who immigrated from Ukraine and homesteaded in Alberta more than a century ago.“For me, it's really neat to look at that and reflect on just how much has changed in those 100 years,” Kutryk said during a prelaunch news conference in August.Kutryk's trip comes after delays on his road to space, including an oxidizer leak discovered in the Dragon spacecraft's propulsion system during prelaunch processing. NASA and SpaceX postponed the mission while teams conducted additional testing and repairs.With Thursday's successful liftoff, the Alberta astronaut is now in orbit and on his way to his new home for the next six months.
