Two cadets of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) fainted on Friday behind Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as he stood before a crowd to give a speech.

The Prime Minister was attending a ceremony in the Canadian city of Regina, capital of Saskatchewan, to name Brenda Lucki, the commanding officer of RCMP's Depot division in Regina, as the first permanent female commissioner of the RCMP.

As Trudeau and the new commissioner stood in front of an audience, two RCMP cadets who stood behind them fainted one after another and had to be guided off the stage.

RCMP major Tammy Patterson subsequently explained to reporters that it is, in fact, "very common for members to faint on parade."

"You're standing still, the blood is not circulating, it's not getting up to your brain and your brain is telling you to faint."

According to CBC, the cadets had been standing for just under an hour before they fainted.

Patterson said that cadets are encouraged to move their feet and squeeze their calves to maintain blood circulation when they must stand for a long time, and speculated that the cadets who fainted had likely avoided moving at all so as not to appear fidgety.

"They were trying their best, I imagine, to look great as a backdrop," she said. "It's a very exciting moment for them to don their red serge, which is a huge thing, and to be that backdrop, it was a really great moment for them and probably also really stressful."