It was one small tweet for a man, but one giant leap for Irish on Monday, when the language was used in space for the first time.
The milestone came courtesy of Canadian astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield, an avid Twitter user who has also been honing his photography skills from the International Space Station.
On Monday night, he tweeted a gorgeous photo of Dublin from space, captioned with the following text:
Tá Éire fíorálainn! Land of green hills and dark beer. With capital Dublin glowing in the Irish night. twitter.com/Cmdr_Hadfield/…
— Chris Hadfield (@Cmdr_Hadfield) February 18, 2013
For those of you who don’t speak Irish, according to the BBC that roughly translates to “Ireland is so very beautiful.” Irish speakers immediately showered the astronaut with praise. Here are some examples:
@cmdr_hadfield you did it. Agus as gaeilge. Go raibh mile maith agat. It looks so beautiful alright. Xx — Barbara Scully (@barbarascully) February 18, 2013
@cmdr_hadfield Pictiúr álainn, go raibh míle maith agat! A great tweet to get on a beautiful night in Dublin. Safe journey, slán abhaile! — Cathal Mac Coille (@CathalMacCoille) February 18, 2013
@cmdr_hadfield go raibh maith agat commander. Go dté tú slán 🙂 — BrianHonan (@BrianHonan) February 18, 2013
Commander Hadfield responded, again with a snippet of Irish:
Wow, I can feel the warmth of the Irish all the way up here – go raibh maith agaibh! I’ll do my best to photo more cities as clouds clear.
— Chris Hadfield (@Cmdr_Hadfield) February 18, 2013
The astronaut doesn’t actually speak Irish, but he does have a daughter who lives in Dublin.
His son, Evan Hadfield, told the BBC that composing the Irish tweets was a family affair, saying “My sister and the internet combined to make sure we weren’t saying something wrong or offensive.”