60 Quotes by Leroy Chiao

The mental stress shouldn't be underplayed. When you're out there doing the work, you can't help but feel the pressure.

I would say keep supporting space flight, keep telling the public and the politicians why it’s important to advance science and explore the galaxy. I encourage the Japanese to keep doing what they’re doing.

Space is very unforgiving business.

My running ambition is to keep doing it until I’m way past the point where I have any business running. Just to keep doing it throughout my whole life – to stay fit and feel good.

Coming down under a parachute is quite different as well. You hit the ground pretty hard, but all the systems work very well to keep it from hurting, so it doesn’t even hurt when you hit. It was a great experience to be able to do both.

I’m Chinese-American, of course, and so it’s very interesting to see China actually launch their own astronauts, becoming the third nation, following the United States and Russia, to do so.

I think it’s good to have competition. Now we have a third country that can launch astronauts, so it’s good for all of us. It makes us a little bit more competitive and wanting to be the leader.

Of course, you’ll have to meet the physical and psychological demands. A space walk takes a lot of energy.

The biggest technical challenge to sending astronauts on farther and longer missions is biomedical: How do we keep them healthy?