All language subtitles for Mission.To.Space.With.Francis.Bourgeois.S01E02.1080p.WEB-DL.H.264-7VFr33104D_track3_[eng]

Francis Bourgeois is known
for his love of trains...

TRAIN HORN BLOWS,
LAUGHING

..but since childhood he's
had another love.

Space.

For the first time in history,

space travel isn't just
for elite pilots

or lifelong professionals.

We are living through a moment

where private companies are opening
up space for everyone.

Not just to visit, but to work,
to live and belong.

And Francis felt now was the time
to see if he had what it takes.

Gonna miss you, sweetie.
I'll miss you too.

Through his journey so far, he had
been forced to confront

some hard truths about
his limitations.

What's your application
process like?

We don't really have an
application process.

Call me.
LAUGHING

But Francis is not one
to give up easily

because even dreams,
especially the big ones,

sometimes need re-routing.

Francis, can you hear us?

Sorry, I'm feeling a bit sick.

It's mine and Amy's anniversary,
and I haven't spoken to her today.

And with access to the cosmos
developing at light speed,

the question that had echoed
in Francis's head his whole life

was about to be put to the test.

Can a train spotter become
an astronaut?

I was halfway across the world
trying to become an astronaut,

but so far things hadn't
exactly gone to plan.

But I'd come to America
to test myself,

and I wasn't about to give up.

Before I continued on my mission,
there was something I needed to do,

someone I needed to call.

PHONE CHIMES
Hello!

Hello.

I'm currently surrounded here
by turkey vultures,

and it sounds like you're surrounded
by crows. Crows.

I love crows.

Uh, yeah, just want to apologise

that we couldn't speak on
our anniversary,

but the main thing is there have
been quite,

quite a few moments where I've
realised that I suppose this...

I might not be kind of totally
cut out for this.

Well, that's all right.
You don't have to be.

It was worrying, not hearing
from you on our anniversary,

but I understand. I understood
that you were probably just busy

and the time difference.
It was quite a busy day.

I understand.

Thank you so much for the
present, darling.

I thought it was so thoughtful.
That's all right.

That's all right. Well, I hope it
reminds you of home

and reminds you how much I love you.

Oh. Love you, too.

All right. Well, bye.

Love you. Bye. Love you.

I'd been in the US
for almost a month.

I came out here to manifest
an opportunity,

but it was becoming clear I still
had work to do

before I was truly ready
to realise my dream.

Under pressure, I had struggled.

So I knew if I wanted to go
to space,

I had to learn to stay calm

in the most extreme
high stress situations.

So I did some research, and that's
when I found a place in Boston,

a facility where real astronauts
are trained

to handle psychological pressure.

It's called Stratus,
a simulation centre

that recreates medical emergencies
in space.

They work with Nasa
and private missions

to teach people how to stay calm
when everything goes sideways,

which, if I'm honest, sounded like
something I could use.

I want to understand whether,
for me,

I can deal with
high pressure scenarios

in the environment of space
where there are already

so many things flying
around my head.

We're going to practise a couple
of skills that you may need

if you were to go up in space

and be encountering some of
these medical emergencies. Yeah.

And then we're going to put it all
together in the afternoon

with a couple of my team members
to practise a scenario

where you are going to be in space,

dealing with one of these
emergencies that come up. OK.

As missions travel deeper into space

and stretch over many months
and even years,

astronauts need to be ready
for anything.

This is one version
of robotic surgery.

If you start moving your hands
now... Whoa!

You can have an expert on Earth and
the patient could be up in space.

Normally, it takes years to learn
how to respond

to medical emergencies, and I only
had a few hours.

So I told myself, stay calm, focus,
and take this seriously.

Can I actually poke myself
in the face?

You can try. Oh!

FRANCIS LAUGHS

Down here on Earth, we use a lot of
tests like X-rays

and Cat scans and MRIs.

Up in space, that's not
an option. Mm-hm.

One thing that they do have up in
space, though, is ultrasound.

Uses piezoelectric crystals, right?

Exactly. You got it. So, inside
these little probes

are little crystals, and that helps
to generate the sound waves.

It's just amazing that it's
as simple as that.

Would it be possible for me
to try it on you?

Erm...

It reminds me of a cross section of
an internal combustion engine. OK.

Just like the suck, squeeze,
bang, blow. Yeah.

My medical training was going
surprisingly well.

Oh!

I was starting to feel
vaguely confident

that I could handle
a cardiac arrest.

Or at the very least,
not make it worse.

Oh. "Manufactured in Pakistan."

Andrew explained to me that a round
trip to Mars

would take two to three years,

and companies are hoping to achieve
this by 2030.

Being cut-off from other humans

means a crew would need to know a
whole host of medical procedures

to look after each other should
the worst happen.

So Andrew wanted to step
up my training

to some more serious
medical scenarios.

I was taken in to the simulated
operating room,

where he taught me how to insert
a chest tube

into a high fidelity
thoracic mannequin,

which is medical simulation speak
for horrifyingly lifelike.

It blinked, it breathed,

and I'm pretty sure it was
judging me.

So this is an endoscopic camera.

So we can put that down.

If someone had really bad
pneumonia... Yeah.

..we could go suck that out.

If someone had a tumour, we could
go find it and take a sample.

OK, so this is now into
the left lung?

Correct.

Wow. Well, I feel like I've explored
a totally different profession

that I never imagined myself doing.

You hope that you're not going
to need these skills up in space,

but sometimes you're going
to need it unexpectedly.

Well... This is called
a needle decompression.

If someone's lung collapses,

it can cause air outside of the lung
to push on the healthy lung.

It's something you have
to do right away,

or the patient can die.

You're just going to go straight
up and down.

Oh! OK.

And then we can take the
needle part out.

OK. Yep.

This would stay in to the patient

until kind of the emergency
was over,

or if they need another
procedure afterwards.

OK. Would the patient typically have
a laptop on their chest?

Not typically, but for
training purposes,

this lets us know if we did it
correctly. Oh, OK.

I felt like I had been
a model student,

but now it was time for the part
that couldn't be taught -

staying calm when everything
goes wrong.

So, we've had a chance this morning
to work with Francis

on learning a couple
different skills,

and now is the time for us to put
those skills together

in responding to a medical scenario.

We work on the human factors

that leads to better performance
in space

when teams like yourselves have
to manage an emergency in space.

Teamwork, effective communication,
and leadership.

So, the goal, really, of the
scenario today

is to give you a little bit of
that experience

and stress you a little bit.

My stress levels were rising,

especially now a Harvard professor
was going to be evaluating

my performance.

Space crew, you're needed in the
sickbay for a medical emergency.

Alongside Nick and Victoria,

two medical students who I'd only
recently become acquainted with...

He's not talking.
VICTORIA: Hello? Are you OK?

He's not talking.

So, Alex was out on a spacewalk,
he just returned,

and he's reporting shortness
of breath and pain in his chest.

I need you to help assess him
and treat him as soon as possible.

Attach pulse oximeter.

Pulse ox - 88.

His oxygen is quite low.

I want to start a
nebuliser treatment.

Get the albuterol out of that kit.

Get the oxygen kit out.

Francis, can you find
that surgical kit?

He may have collapsed one of
his lungs.

We need to do a needle
decompression,

so I want you to find one of
those long needles.

OK. Victoria, can you feel
for pulses?

Nick, can you keep an eye on
that C-array monitor?

So-Sorry. Sorry, Andrew, uh,
what am I looking for again?

There are some orange needles
to your left.

Get out one of those needles.
We gotta do it fast.

His oxygen is getting lower.

I feel pulses on both sides,
and they're regular.

Thank you, Victoria.

Middle of that bone there
and two rib spaces down,

we're going to put that needle
straight in.

OK. You gotta do it. Alex...
His oxygen's getting lower.

We gotta do it. OK,
so straight in.

Go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

OK, come on, Alex.

Oh, no. Sorry, that's...

Push, push, push, push, push.
I think it's on his rib.

OK, erm...

Trying to... Yep. Do it the best
you can. We gotta do it.

It's not going into Alex.

I'm really sorry, Alex.

How far down can I go?

As far as it can go,
we just got to get it done.

WARNING BEEPS

Yeah, he has bilateral pulses, but
they're pretty quick.

OK. OK, yes.

Come on, Alex, you're a fighter.
Push, push, push, push, push.

Stay with us, Alex. Straight in.
Straight in. Straight in.

Yeah, it's all the way in.

All right. And take the needle out.
Leave the coloured part in.

Oh, I took it out.
No, I took the whole...

No, I took the whole thing out.

OK, that's back in.

You can get another one
if you need to.

No, it's off now. Yeah, I can't see.
Is the catheter in his chest?

Yes, it's in, it's in.

OK, Alex, how are you doing?
How are you feeling?

It's OK, Alex.

All right, team, that is the end
of your scenario.

Please leave everything where it is
and report to the debrief room.

Thank you all for participating
in that.

I know it can be a little
bit stressful.

Did you feel like you were
getting stressed at all?

Yeah, well, especially when the
blood oxygen levels were dropping.

We also experienced
a needle malfunction.

OK. I thought I was going through,
but I was getting resistance.

Yep. And then it happened again,
and I just thought,

"I'm making things worse here."

Alex has already got
a collapsed lung,

and I'm there poking him with
the needle.

And then I ended up pulling
the whole needle out. Yeah.

The time here in emergency space
is extremely important.

Due to some of the delays
in the needle decompression,

the patient, unfortunately,
will not survive.

It's a bit of an eye opener that
just a slight misjudgment

of my needle placement...

..basically meant that Alex wouldn't
be able to return home

from the International
Space Station.

It's...It's a lot more than just
exciting engineering

and loud rockets and G-Force and,
you know,

seeing Earth from afar.

And at the moment, in my mind,

kind of the scary, daunting,
worrying things

are slightly outweighing
my excitement, I suppose.

Erm...

VOICEOVER: I had trained
for the worst,

but still I wasn't ready,

because in space, even the best
preparation can unravel

in a heartbeat.

And right in the middle of filming
this series,

something happened that made
that reality hit home.

# When I die and they lay me to rest

# Gonna go to the place
that's the best

# When I lay me down to die

# Going up to the spirit
in the sky... #

Luckily, this was only a test flight
and nobody died.

But it brought it all home again.

Space is no place
for the faint hearted.

FRANCIS: I had just killed a
colleague called Alex

in a medical space
emergency simulation,

and even though he was made
of silicon,

it was a harsh reminder that going
to space

could very easily be
a one-way ticket.

And whilst I wasn't frightened
of that,

I was worried for the people
I'd be leaving behind.

This wasn't a new thought to me.

I had felt it creeping up on me
like a slow-moving freight train,

which is why, before I had even left
for America,

I met with Dr Iya Whitely,

a space psychologist who works with
Nasa astronauts on this very fear,

and I thought it was important to
share with you

a part of our conversation,

because there was a very
personal reason

why I was struggling with the idea
of leaving the planet behind.

How do I stop my family
and my girlfriend from worrying?

CHUCKLING

Well, that's a good question.

And we would usually ask,

how do you navigate that?

I feel a bit selfish.

Mm-hm. And I feel like I'm
making a decision for myself

that is having an impact on
someone who I love.

Amy has a form of epilepsy... Mm-hm.

..and that's been something
that's developed

in the last three years.

So, I've gone from being
in a relationship

that is still wonderful
and still blossoming

and still so happy, but in my head
I'm worrying, as well.

Mm. I don't want to leave that.

I don't want to... I don't want to
leave that behind on Earth

because I always want to be there
for her... Yeah.

..and I always want to be by her
side if she needs me. Mm-hm.

So, one of the things that we do is
that you record a message

in the eventuality that it's
impossible to return home.

OK. I don't want to ask you now,
but you may wish to do that or not,

in terms of thinking of what
you put into that message.

It's up to you.

Yeah. I think I'd want her
to know that, whatever happens,

I...I will be kind of around
in some way or other. Mm-hm.

Like my cat, Makka Pakka,
is in my ring.

Oh. In what capacity?

His ashes. Oh.

Erm... Sorry.

So I, erm... I feel like he's always
with me.

Yeah.

And I hope in some way that she
could do the same

if anything bad were to happen.

But, yeah...

Sorry, my cat always triggers me.

THEY CHUCKLE

Well, thank you for
sharing that. Yeah.

An unexpected part of this adventure

is that I'm inadvertently training
myself to be away from Amy.

Not long ago, two astronauts,
Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams,

launched on what was meant
to be an eight-day mission.

But when their return capsule ran
into serious faults,

they were stuck in orbit
for 286 days.

Engineers on Earth worked around
the clock to bring them home,

and they thankfully made it
back safely.

But it was still a reminder
that even now,

with all our technology
and ambition,

space is still unpredictable.

So I thought if I could experience
what it's actually like

to be isolated, it might help
straighten my thoughts

about leaving my loved ones behind.

As part of my research, I was
intrigued by a company

called Exolith that was doing some
exciting work

in the area of lunar reproduction,

building one of the world's largest
replicas of the Moon's surface.

To start off, they wanted to show me
the secret recipe

of how a lunar surface is made.

This kind of looks like the set-up
for a cooking show.

Exactly, yeah. We say it's
like baking a cake.

Start out with the
anorthosite 250.

Basalt.

Bronzite.

Olivine.

Which is your favourite component,
if you could have a favourite?

I like the anorthosite, honestly.

I couldn't help but agree
that the anorthosite

was particularly special,

and I was excited to see it
in its mock lunar environment.

So, this is the Regolith Bin.

As you can see, yeah, over 130 tons
in this bin.

Before I stepped in, I
was told to put on some PPE

as moon dust is abrasive
and can be hazardous.

It does dry your hair out
quite a bit.

I already have a really dry scalp...
Uh-oh. ..so this might not be ideal.

I was suited up and ready to step
into the Regolith Bin,

a ten by ten metre replica of
the lunar surface.

Nasa's Artemis mission is
planning to return humans

to the moon in 2026.

At Axiom, I had already got
up close with the very suit

that the astronauts will be wearing
for this mission.

And now, for the first time,
I wasn't just imagining the moon...

..I was walking on something
that felt just like it.

Whoa!

That's a crater. There you go.

LAUGHING
There you go.

Whoa!

There you go. That's what we're
talking about.

The team set me a task to search
for buried ice,

just like the Artemis crews
eventually will

when they return to the moon...

Wow. It really sticks to the shovel.

It does, yeah.

..because lunar ice, in theory,
could be used to create rocket fuel,

which would be a game-changer
for long-term space missions.

Here you go. All right.

Oh, we've found it.

LAUGHING
Yeah, we have.

So it was nowhere near
where I was digging.

Well... Maybe not.

This has been such a formative
experience for me

in a way of understanding
what it's like on the moon,

you know, from a materials point
of view... Yeah. ..and how it feels.

It's kind of also like being
in a desert

and another form of
astronaut training

where they have wilderness survival,
isolation training. Yeah.

And I was wondering if perhaps
I could maybe...

I don't know if... I'll need
to ask if it's all right,

but perhaps if, like, I could maybe,
just maybe be here

for an extended period of time.
Right, OK, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, an extended
duration mission. Do it.

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. Is that...?
I think so, yeah.

Do you have anything going on,
like, overnight?

No, we're free.

Sleepover. Yeah.

If I was ever going to understand
what space might take from me,

I wanted to feel what it might be
like to be truly isolated.

I feel like it can add another
element to kind of the training.

So I asked the production team

if someone could kindly pick me up
a tent

so I could pitch up for the night on
the Regolith.

Is that OK? Yeah.

Do you ever get Regolithy bogeys?

As night fell, I stepped back onto
the Regolith.

Just me and a few billion grains
of synthetic moon dust.

I wanted to see if I could handle
the silence

and be left alone
with my own thoughts.

Have a good night, Francis.

As I began to pitch my tent,

I started to think about my
conversation with Dr Whiteley.

Camping on a fake moon felt like
the safest place

to try and say something honest.

I wasn't entirely sure what was
about to come out of my mouth,

so I pointed my phone camera
at my face,

which is the set-up I normally use
for recording TikToks

about trains for my followers.

But this was different,

as this video was only meant
for one person.

Hello, Amy.

Even though you're far away...

..and we're not together,

we're not at Pembroke Lodge
having a chai latte,

we're not, you know, going on
the Thames Clipper,

..we're...

Yeah. I'm...I'm still there
with you.

And we have each other

and all we've given each other
in our experiences,

our shared knowledge and our love.

And what you've given me is...

..incredible and life-changing.

I wouldn't be here, where I am now,
if it wasn't for you.

And I just want to say I love you
and I will always be with you.

Space travel demands more than just
strength and science.

It asks you to sever the threads
that tether you

to the people that you love.

And as I lay alone in a sea
of artificial dust,

I began to understand the gravity
of that distance.

Yeah, I think you might need
to stop.

I think we might just miss it.

OK. Stop, stop.

Stop.

TRAIN HORN BLOWS

I have always loved trains.

How they move, how they work,

how sometimes it feels like they're
alive and talking to me.

After the setbacks I'd faced trying
to become an astronaut,

I needed to ground myself

because there was no way I could
come to America

and not see the largest operational
steam locomotive in the world.

TRAIN HORN BLOWS

A 600-tonne monument to
human ingenuity

and the machine that fuelled my
childhood love for engineering -

Union Pacific's Big Boy.

Built in the 1940s,

only 25 were ever made.

Each one 132ft long,

designed to haul freight over the
Rocky Mountains during World War II.

And today, 4014 is the only
operational Big Boy

left in the world.

It's not just big, it's historic.

And to me and many other railway
enthusiasts around the world,

it's mythic.

This is the locomotive at
the top of everyone's list.

I've watched clips of it for years,
processed its sounds,

dreamt of one day standing
in front of it.

And although this wasn't technically
part of my astronaut journey,

I knew that if I was going to
move forward,

I had to reconnect with
where it all began.

Is it... Is it behind me right now?

That's the Big Boy right here. OK.

Oh. Oh, my goodness me.

Wow.

I honestly couldn't believe
what I was looking at.

Even though it was stationary,

I could feel its power.

INDISTINCT

But you can see the work
that we're doing.

You can see that little paper tag
in there. Yeah.

Sorry.

LAUGHS
Very good. It's cool, isn't it?

FRANCIS SNIFFLES

It's... I'm, like,
totally overwhelmed.

Just looking at this cylinder
and thinking the amount of pressure,

the amount of energy...

And usually, like, my emotional
stimulation comes through noise,

and it's enough of a visual feast to
provoke this response, I suppose.

For me, coming here,

there aren't any stressful
strings attached

that I've been feeling with this
astronaut training process.

I think not only has this been great
just to see for my own passion,

but has also been a bit of
a point of...

Almost like a point of
realisation, I suppose.

Like, what do I really want to do
with my life?

You know, this...this is so...

In my mind, so emotionally
uncomplicated.

And I can tell my girlfriend, "I'm
going off to see a train today,"

and not, "I'm going off
to the outer atmosphere."

Seeing Big Boy, not only was it just
a big bucket list item,

but it's actually been quite helpful

in understanding what I really
want from this.

There is a common ground, of course,
between the railway and space,

and that's engineering.

You know, we can still explore
the space industry,

but maybe we can just
boil it down

to more of, like, an
engineering focus.

I came to America with
the grand idea

of trying to become an astronaut,

but standing in front of Big Boy,
I realised something.

Engineering runs through my veins.

Maybe I don't need to leave Earth
to be part of space.

Perhaps I could help build
the future from here.

So I reached out to Firefly,

a Texas-based rocket manufacturer
who are building launch systems

for Nasa and beyond,

to see if I could understand how
people like me

might still have a role in the new
Space Age.

Right, I'm just gonna put
my helmet away.

And I could tell pretty quickly I
was surrounded by my kind of people.

We have our pneumatic systems.

So, this accumulator here will be
all the GN2 pneumatics...

Without getting into a lecture
on pneumatics,

it's safe to say I was in heaven.

All the testing pneumatics,
all the GSE plumbing,

propellant valves, nitrogen valves,
purge valves.

This is Reaver. Wow!

Oh, my goodness.

Wow. Is this, like, the
tap off exhaust, then?

Correct. This is the exhaust, yeah.

These engines actually are the first
tap off cycle engines

to have reached orbit.

And that, in general, usually
increases the specific impulse,

doesn't it? Right, yes.
These engines are very efficient.

It's a very reliable design.

It's about 45,000 foot-pounds
of thrust... Yeah. ..per Reaver.

So, today we'll actually be trimming
the engine in for flight.

My engineering mind is just,
like, popping off

all over the place at the moment.

Yeah, you'll have a lot of fun
today. You're in the right place.

What a dream to work somewhere
like here.

The best job in the world for sure.

What's this pooling at the
bottom here?

That's a little bit of RP1.

On my finger. On your finger.

OK. You'll probably want to get some
IPA, clean that off.

LAUGHING

I've never touched refined
kerosene before.

After thoroughly washing my hands
with isopropyl alcohol,

I was introduced to some of the team

who were building the actual
rocket engines,

and instantly I was drawn in.

Do you have a favourite
kind of weave?

A favourite weave? I can't say.

You can't say?

I'm not allowed to say
what we use here.

Oh, right. OK. But I do.
I do have a favourite weave.

My favourite weave is also a secret.

We say the rocket talks to you.

Are you going to listen?

Right? And seriously, the data, the
numbers, the vibrations,

dynamic shock, it talks to you.

What's it like working here?

It is never boring.
It is a roller-coaster every day.

What I love about it is
that I can own...

Like, that's mine.

When you see it launch, you're just
like... It's like your child.

You're like, "Oh, there they go,"
you know? It's so beautiful.

These hold 5,500 PSIA
at cryogenic temperatures.

It's like you're singing to me.
JORDI LAUGHS

My brain is receiving
your information

and is being stimulated in the same
way that I'd listen to music.

What you're listening for is a dull,
kind of hollow sound,

and that would indicate
that you have a void.

Ooh-hoo.

HAMMERING, CLICKING

Wow!

We're just finding the
resonant frequency.

We have it calculated.

It looks like a happy whale.

Yeah, this is cool.

I got it.

Spending time with the engineers,
it just clicked.

I felt like I'd found my people.

Curious minds solving big problems.

And then, as if things couldn't
get any more exciting,

the team asked me if I'd
like to see something

I'd never thought I'd witness
in real life.

A hot fire rocket engine test.

ROCKET ENGINE FIRES

Whoa!

Oh, my God!

Whoa!

Oh, my God!

BREATHING HEAVILY

Oh, my God. It's hard to put
into words right?

When you... When you can
feel it in your soul.

I'm in... I'm in shock.

That noise... The vwoop-pff!

Yeah, you can hear the turbopump
spool up,

and then it just hits you
all at once.

ROCKET ENGINE FIRES
Oh.

That's one of my new
favourite noises... Right?

..alongside with the
Paxman Ruston 16RK3CTs.

The job satisfaction that comes from
actually launching a rocket

or doing these types of things
is just unmatched.

And as I understand, you know,
Firefly's as a company

is expanding, right?

We're growing pretty exponentially.

Lunar landers, Alpha launch,
our medium launch vehicle Eclipse.

Yeah. Are you looking for a job?

Well... I mean, yeah.

My engineering kind of skills
and expertise, it's there.

There's your flame right there.

Oh, nice. Yeah.

I think I was just offered a job,

but unfortunately, I was distracted
by some afterburn.

I've got the feeling

it's making me realise that this
side of kind of the space industry

is kind of where the energy is kind
of pulling me, in a way,

like being launched into space.

You know, that's tying into my
sensation of centrifuges,

sensation of oxygen deprivation.

This is just tying into love
and, like, passion.

For the first time, I started
to believe

I might actually belong in the world
of space.

I had failed my mission to become
an astronaut,

but here, amongst my
fellow engineers,

perhaps I had discovered my calling.

But then, just as I was starting
to believe it,

everything changed.

So, remember Matt Ondler
from Axiom?

He's just sent through a message.

Hi, Francis. We're in final
preparation for Ax-4,

which will be another
historic mission

to the International Space Station.

And it got me thinking about our
conversations about your next steps.

I know you're serious about taking
your engineering skills

from the workshop to orbit,

and we want to help you do that

and talk about our astronaut
training opportunities.

Axiom Station will be in orbit
before we know it,

and we're going to need crew.

So look forward to talking to you
soon, Francis. Bye.

Sorry, I'm going to watch it again.

Taking your engineering skills
to orbit.

We want to help you do that.

Astronaut training opportunities.

But this is... He's talking about
Axiom Station, like, in orbit

and needing crew.

I know you're serious about taking
your engineering skills

from the workshop to orbit,

and we want to help you do that

and talk about our astronaut
training opportunities.

We're going to need crew.

So look forward to talking to you
soon, Francis. Bye.

I had come all this way to try and
get a foot in the space industry,

and now, somehow, I'd been offered
a place

on an actual astronaut
training programme...

..and I didn't have a clue
what to do.

I was missing home, my body ached,

and my brain felt like it was
orbiting itself.

I needed somewhere quiet to think.

Somewhere that reminded me why I
started this journey

in the first place.

So I searched for "space museum
near me"

and found the American Space Museum,

which was, conveniently, near me.

I was expecting something grand,

like a gleaming Nasa-style
hall of heroism,

but what I got was a small bungalow.

However, as I'd soon come
to realise,

sometimes the smallest places hold
the biggest stories.

I was hoping for some
quiet reflection,

but whilst I began perusing
the various oddities,

a man suddenly appeared
and introduced himself to me.

Welcome to the American Space
Museum. Thank you.

OK, we love having foreign
visitors here.

He was Mark Marquette,
the museum director,

who then unexpectedly proceeded
to give me a private

and extensive tour of some of
the most incredible fragments

of history I'd ever seen.

And it's no exaggeration to say
that this chance encounter

influenced the biggest decision
of my life.

This is the hatch of the first
Mercury that was launched

on an Atlas rocket, and it blew up.

We've got John Glenn's hard hat
and pictures of him wearing it.

The world's first lithium battery
that powers your cellphone.

Flight manual from Apollo 11 here.

This is the computer that took us to
the moon, the slide rule.

This is Leland Melvin, and he likes
Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs.

How do you know that?

This person was hearing 20
conversations going on at one time.

It's so beautifully retro.

Let me show you this.

Our newspaper... Oh, wow.
..from 1969.

I've got goose bumps. You should
have been there.

So, this is launched over
350 Atlas II rockets

and a couple other rockets on there.

Flip that emergency control.

ALARM BLARES
Oh.

MARK LAUGHS

But we had a gentleman came
in that was 80-something years old.

He walked over to this machine,
looks, "Oh, my gosh.

"This is my machine." Really?

"I worked on this machine
in 1963, 1964.

"I pushed this start and stop button
so many times I can't count it."

And he stood there and froze
and looked,

and I saw tears welling
up in his eyes.

And I said, "Sir, what are you
thinking about?"

And he turned to me, Francis,
and he said,

"Damn it, I loved everybody
who worked here.

"I was 27 years old,
and we were going to the moon."

His name was John Bauerlein.

And I go over to this picture
and I say,

"Do you recognise anybody
in this picture?"

And his son goes, "That's you, Dad."

And that's Jim.

And I went to school
with Bob's kids.

And Bill died last year.

And I mean, I was like,

I was like almost crying now, just
thinking about this, you know.

This... And then I tell people this
story, and I say, like...

They had pride in their craft...
Sorry. ..all right?

They had pride in their craft.
Oh. OK?

It gets to you, too, buddy.

I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm
getting so, like, erm...

Oh! That's what we're all about
here, my friend.

That's... This is... This is, like,
just pure passion.

Like, our spirits at the moment
are just dancing together.

Absolutely.

It's like a...

It's... It's a sensory overload.

The associations of the stories
with each object...

..gives me such goose bumps.

And kind of... What a brilliant
conduit for it all

to hear it through Mark's kind
of brilliant enthusiasm.

I just get passionate
about it, Francis,

because I grew up with this
as a boy,

and I hope other people have
in their lifetime

something that they truly enjoy
and are passionate about,

that they can share with
other people.

Yeah. And that's the cool
thing about this whole thing.

You don't have to fly the spaceship.

There's something for everybody
when it comes to space.

It felt like every nut and bolt
had a story,

and every scorch-marked relic
had a soul.

Everything was real and analogue.

And for someone who grew up online,
it felt refreshingly human.

And whilst most museum guides
wrap up with a gift shop,

Mark had other ideas.

We do a podcast called Stay Curious
to talk to space workers.

Would you do an interview with me?

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Good.

I mean... Well, we'll set
that up here.

I wasn't exactly in the mood
to be interviewed,

but Mark was just too kind
to refuse.

And that looks good.

My lights here, our little crude
studio here.

I actually unintentionally left
this tie in my jacket pocket.

I feel like it'd be suitable
for this occasion. OK.

But deep down, I knew I
had something I needed to say,

not just to Mark, but to myself.

Today, with a special guest
from the UK, Francois Bourgeois.

Francois, welcome to our humble
little podcast here.

Sorry, it's Francis Bourgeois.

I've been calling you Francis
all day, so... Yeah.

Just got a little carried away with
the introduction.

Tell us a little bit about
yourself, Francis.

Yeah. How did you get into
this career?

This is kind of my first time
in America,

so it's been a real learning
experience for me

about what I might want to do.

Um, my interest lies very strongly
in engineering,

but through a lot of...you know,
some of the training processes

I've been exposed to,

you know, it's made me feel quite
anxious and stressed

and, you know, maybe I'm realising
that, you know,

maybe the astronaut journey
isn't for me.

But perhaps my passion
lies elsewhere.

In astronautical engineering,

you know, infrastructure
engineering,

and maybe even just being a...

Sorry.

Maybe even just, um, you know,
doing shows like this

to show how awesome it is
to be part of,

like, the sort of...the
profession in the space world,

or even to inspire those to become
an astronaut.

I would not be discouraged about
your quest to be an astronaut.

You have your dreams.

You don't know where your dreams
are going to take you...

Yeah. ..in there.

There's many other roles to assume.

You know, I have my beautiful,
lovely girlfriend, Amy,

back at home, my brilliant family...
Uh-huh. ..and all my friends

who, you know, I don't have
to worry about,

you know, if I were to never see
them again.

Amy gave me a present before I left.

Oh, my gosh. Look, that's me,
and that's my girlfriend, Amy.

Wow.

She really loves you.

Yeah. Look at that.

That is awesome.

Yeah. Amy's something else there.

Yeah, she's beautiful,
even in model form.

Well, I hope that you find
what you're looking for

in this journey of being
an astronaut.

Thank you for sharing your story
here with our watchers

and listeners here on Stay Curious.

Until next time that I meet you all,
I want to say I'm Mark Marquette,

and I can't wait to see you again
to bridge the space between us.

Thank you so much. Thank you, Mark.

Was that... Was that OK?

I could have stayed with Mark
all day.

What he'd built was extraordinary.

Not just a collection,
but a cathedral of stories.

I felt like I had touched the past,
and it had touched me back.

But even after all that,
I was still stuck.

I had been offered the thing I set
out to find - a way into space -

and I didn't know whether to
say yes.

Cheerio. Cheerio. See you later.

Now, there's somebody that's going
to do something with his life,

I guarantee it.

THUNDER RUMBLES

So I paddled to the coast.

There was a rocket due to launch
that evening,

and I thought maybe watching
someone else go

might help me work out if
I really wanted to.

THUNDER RUMBLES

Wow!

Oh, my God.

HE LAUGHS

There are people on that.

Oh. Oh, that's the
booster returning.

Wow.

THUNDER RUMBLES,
WATER LAPPING

Hello, Matt. Thank you, truly,
for your offer.

I never imagined I'd get this far,

let alone have someone like you
and Axiom believe in me.

I came to America chasing
a childhood dream,

and I found myself being violently
sick on a zero gravity flight...

Sorry, I'm feeling a bit sick.

..accidentally killing
a medical dummy

in a simulated space disaster...

Sorry, Alex.

..starving my brain of oxygen
in a hyperbaric chamber,

and singing an Elton John classic

to a room full of very
enthusiastic strangers.

HE LAUGHS

And along the way,
I met some of the kindest

and most brilliant people
I've ever come across.

But somewhere between all of this,
I realised something.

I don't need to go to space
to prove I belong in it.

So I'm going to have to politely
decline your offer,

but only because this journey gave
me something even more valuable

and I'm leaving with more than
I ever came looking for.

I'm ready to go home.

THUNDER RUMBLES,
LIGHTNING CRASHES

So you plunge the needle through...

Yeah. ..in between the ribs,

and then you can kind of reinflate
the lung using that method.

How did you find that?
Did you enjoy it?

Could that be a future career?

Probably not.

STEPHEN FRY: Space is no longer
a mystery.

It's a marketplace.

And in this new age
of extraordinary possibility,

one must pause to ask,

who are we really opening the stars
up to and for what reason?

Francis's journey had begun with
that very question,

but along the way he discovered
that while the cosmos might be vast,

the space within one's heart
is infinite.

As he stood beside Amy, watching
a balloon fill up with hydrogen,

he knew that while he would always
reach for the stars,

his home would forever be here,

amidst the laughter, joy, and love
of his earthly existence.

FRANCIS: Up it goes.

HE LAUGHS
Wow.

So speedy.

STEPHEN FRY: And as they watched the
balloon disappear into the blue,

Francis understood
that his real journey

was not about escaping
the ties of Earth,

but about appreciating them,

for the beauty of our planet
and the bonds we cherish

are the true anchors of our dreams.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media