Julie Payette

Born in Montreal, Julie Payette is an astronaut, engineer, corporate director and science communicator. She was the Governor General of Canada from 2017 to 2021.

She has a degree in electrical engineering from McGill University and a master’s degree from the University of Toronto, specializing in automatic speech recognition, a discipline of artificial intelligence. She trained as a pilot with the Royal Canadian Air Force and holds a civilian commercial pilot’s license.

Ms. Payette was selected as an astronaut by the Canadian Space Agency and joined NASA in 1996. She flew two missions in space for the construction of the International Space Station: STS96 (in 1999) and STS127 (in 2009) where she held the position of flight engineer. She has flown 611 hours in space and over 1500 hours in various types of aircraft. In between flights, Ms. Payette worked as a liaison officer in Russia, Japan and Europe, and held the position of CAPCOM (Capsule Communicator), the voice of NASA’s Mission Control Center in Houston, Texas. She was Chief Astronaut of the Canadian Space Agency from 2000 to 2007.

After her career in space, Julie Payette worked as a science diplomat in Washington DC. In 2013, she was appointed Director of the Montréal Science Centre. She has served on the boards of several public and not-for-profit companies. As a science communicator, she has produced several educational programs and often appears at technical forums and in the media. She is currently a Senior Fellow at Massey College, University of Toronto and remains active in the aerospace research community, including for the search for solutions to the proliferation of orbital debris.

She is a trustee of the International Academy of Astronautics and an executive member of the Association of Space Explorers. Ms. Payette can converse in six languages and has a passion for sports and music. She was a member of the International Olympic Committee’s Women in Sport commission and has sung with several ensembles, including the Ottawa Bach Choir, with whom she won a Juno Award in 2020 (the equivalent of a Grammy award in Canada). These days, she sings with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra choir, and during the Canadian winter, she volunteers as a ski patrol. Ms. Payette has received numerous distinctions, including 29 honorary doctorates. She is a Knight of the National Order of Quebec and a Companion of the Order of Canada.