ISS - Blog Posts
How does a microgravity garden grow when there’s no up or down? An advanced chamber, about the size of a mini-fridge, is giving us a clearer perspective of plant growth habits. Without gravity and the addition of a wide variety of light and humidity settings, the plants cultivated on the International Space Station provide a world of opportunity to study space-based agricultural cycles.
Learn more about our space garden HERE.
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I imagine most people wanted to be astronauts when they learned it was a job they could have - I certainly did! And then I thought about it and realized podcasting about outer space was much less scary and much more achievable than becoming an astronaut, with the bonus of not having to wonder how hard I’d panic in an enclosed-yet-surrounded-by-vastness space. There have been a lot of people braver than me who went to space, and some of them went to space on long-term missions lasting months or a year, living on the International Space Station (or the historical equivalent, depending on when in history this happened). Learn what resources are available to ISS astronauts, and what risks there are out there (apart from the obvious ones).
Sorry I missed last week, but it was New Year’s and I don’t feel very guilty. Get excited about more space podcasts in 2018, though! Below the cut are my sources, music credits, a vocab list, and the transcript of this episode. I bolded any videos or sources that I mentioned in the podcast, if you’re looking for those specifically. Go ahead and suggest what you think I should research next by messaging me here, tweeting at me at @HDandtheVoid, or asking me to my face if you know me. Please subscribe on iTunes, rate it and maybe review it, and tell friends if you think they’d like to hear it!
(My thoughts on the next episode are more about astronauts, or I could go into the transit of Venus. I have a couple books about space I should really get into reading… The next episode will go up January 22nd.)
Glossary
free fall - the downward movement of an object that is due to the force of gravity alone.
gravity - the phenomenon which causes all things with mass to move towards each other. On the universal scale, this is caused by the warping of spacetime by objects with large mass, e.g. stars and planets, and is explained through Einstein’s theory of general relativity.
microgravity - the state of perpetual free fall in a gravity field.
orbit - the gravitationally curved trajectory of an object, e.g. the trajectory of a satellite around a planet.
Script/Transcript
Sources
Yuri Gagarin via NASA
Microgravity via NASA (Feb 2012)
The history of astronaut life via the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum
Menstruation in space via National Geographic (Apr 2016)
The Air We Breathe via the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center
Breathing Easy on the Space Station via NASA (Nov 2000)
Jay Perry: “the chemical-mechanical systems are much more compact, less labor intensive, and more reliable than a plant-based system.”
Astronaut’s Home Videos Show How to Cook in Space via Space.com (Mar 2013)
Astronaut Hygiene: How to Wash Your Hair In Space (Video) via Space.com (July 2013)
Interview with former astronaut Prof. Jeremy Hoffman via the University of Leicester
A day in the life aboard the International Space Station via NASA (2015)
Zvezda Module Overview via NASA
Food for Space Flight via Nasa (Feb 2004)
John Glenn via NASA (Feb 2012)
Crew From U.S., Russia and Japan Expands Space Population to Six via NASA (Dec 2017)
ISS blog with experiment updates via NASA
Astronaut daily life via ESA (Nov 2012)
The Skylab 4 Mutiny, 1973 via libcom.org (Apr 2004)
Carr: “On the ground, I don’t think we would be expected to work a 16-hour day for 85 days, and so I really don’t see why we should even try to do it up here.”
‘Space Oddity’ by Chris Hadfield via YouTube
Interview with astronaut Chris Hadfield via NPR (Oct 2013)
Col. Chris Hadfield: “The contrast of your body and your mind inside … essentially a one-person spaceship, which is your spacesuit, where you’re holding on for dear life to the shuttle or the station with one hand, and you are inexplicably in between what is just a pouring glory of the world roaring by, silently next to you — just the kaleidoscope of it, it takes up your whole mind. It’s like the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen just screaming at you on the right side, and when you look left, it’s the whole bottomless black of the universe and it goes in all directions. It’s like a huge yawning endlessness on your left side and you’re in between those two things and trying to rationalize it to yourself and trying to get some work done.”
Excerpt from memoir by former astronaut Scott Kelly via the Sunday Morning Herald (Oct 2017)
Intro Music: ‘Better Times Will Come’ by No Luck Club off their album Prosperity
Filler Music: ‘Major Tom’ by Shiny Toy Guns off their album Major Tom.
Background Music: ‘Leaves’ by Patients aka Ben Cooper, who primarily releases music as Radical Face but also has at least three other bands or band names he’s working with/has released music as.
Outro Music: ‘Fields of Russia’ by Mutefish off their album On Draught
Aboard the International Space Station, astronaut Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency snapped this photo and wrote, ‘The view at night recently has been simply magnificent: few clouds, intense #aurora. I can’t look away from the windows.'
The dancing lights of the aurora provide stunning views, but also capture the imagination of scientists who study incoming energy and particles from the sun. Aurora are one effect of such energetic particles, which can speed out from the sun both in a steady stream called the solar wind and due to giant eruptions known as coronal mass ejections or CMEs. Credit: NASA/ESA
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Spacewalkers Successfully Connect Adapter for Commercial Crew Vehicles
ISS - Expedition 50 Mission patch / EVA - Extra Vehicular Activities patch. March 30, 2017 Expedition 50 Commander Shane Kimbrough and Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson of NASA concluded their spacewalk at 2:33 p.m. EDT. During the spacewalk, which lasted just over seven hours, the two astronauts successfully reconnected cables and electrical connections on the Pressurized Mating Adapter-3. PMA-3 will provide the pressurized interface between the station and the second of two international docking adapters to be delivered to the complex to support the dockings of U.S. commercial crew spacecraft in the future.
Image above: Spacewalkers Shane Kimbrough (spacesuit with red stripe on legs) and Peggy Whitson are pictured shortly after exiting the Quest airlock this morning. Image Credits: @Thom_Astro. The duo were also tasked with installing four thermal protection shields on the Tranquility module of the International Space Station. The shields were required to cover the port where the PMA-3 was removed earlier in the week and robotically installed on the Harmony module. During the spacewalk, one of the shields was inadvertently lost. The loss posed no immediate danger to the astronauts and Kimbrough and Whitson went on to successfully install the remaining shields on the common berthing mechanism port. A team from the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston devised a plan for the astronauts to finish covering the port with the PMA-3 cover Whitson removed earlier in the day. The plan worked, and the cover was successfully installed, providing thermal protection and micrometeoroid and orbital debris cover for the port. To round out the spacewalk, Kimbrough and Whitson also installed a different shield around the base of the PMA-3 adapter for micrometeoroid protection. The shield was nicknamed a cummerbund as it fits around the adapter similar to a tuxedo’s cummerbund worn around the waist.
Image above: Astronaut Peggy Whitson signs her autograph near an Expedition 50 mission patch attached to the inside the International Space Station. Image Credit: NASA. Having completed her eighth spacewalk, Whitson now holds the record for the most spacewalks and accumulated time spacewalking by a female astronaut. Spacewalkers have now spent a total of 1,243 hours and 42 minutes outside the station during 199 spacewalks in support of assembly and maintenance of the orbiting laboratory. Related links: International docking adapters: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/meet-the-international-docking-adapter Peggy Whitson spacewalk record: https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacestation/2017/03/29/astronaut-peggy-whitson-set-to-break-spacewalk-record-thursday/ Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia. Best regards, Orbiter.ch Full article
Space Station Crew Members Walk In Space to Connect Docking Adapter Component
Outside the International Space Station, Expedition 50 Commander Shane Kimbrough and Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson of NASA conducted a spacewalk March 30 to connect the newly relocated Pressurized Mating Adapter-3 (PMA-3) to the Harmony module in preparation for the delivery of an International Docking Adapter to PMA-3 to which U.S. commercial crew spacecraft will link up to in the years ahead. The mating adapter was robotically relocated from the port side of the Tranquility module to Harmony March 26 by ground controllers. Kimbrough and Whitson also installed the second of two upgraded computer relay boxes on the station’s truss and installed shields and covers over PMA-3 and the vacant port on Tranquility to which the PMA had been attached. It was the 199th spacewalk in support of space station assembly and maintenance, the sixth in Kimbrough’s career and the eighth for Whitson, who surpassed NASA’s Suni Williams for most spacewalks and most aggregate spacewalking time by a female.
Scott Kelly just tweeted this photo of the Moon, Venus, Jupiter and Earth as seen from the International Space Station
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Deep Space Gateway to Open Opportunities for Distant Destinations
NASA logo. March 29, 2017 NASA is leading the next steps into deep space near the moon, where astronauts will build and begin testing the systems needed for challenging missions to deep space destinations including Mars. The area of space near the moon offers a true deep space environment to gain experience for human missions that push farther into the solar system, access the lunar surface for robotic missions but with the ability to return to Earth if needed in days rather than weeks or months. The period of exploration in the vicinity of the moon will begin with the first integrated mission of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and the Orion spacecraft, and will continue as we explore further. NASA aims to begin a cadence of one flight per year after the second mission, and the agency has established an initial set of integrated human exploration objectives combining the efforts aboard the International Space Station, SLS and Orion, and other capabilities needed to support human missions to explore deep space. Flight hardware for SLS and Orion is currently in production for the first and second missions, life support and related technologies are being tested on ISS, and habitation and propulsion development activities are also underway. NASA is working with domestic and international partners to solve the great challenges of deep space exploration. Missions in the vicinity of the moon will span multiple phases as part of NASA’s framework to build a flexible, reusable and sustainable infrastructure that will last multiple decades and support missions of increasing complexity. Deep Space Gateway This first phase of exploration near the moon will use current technologies and allow us to gain experience with extended operations farther from Earth than previously completed. These missions enable NASA to develop new techniques and apply innovative approaches to solving problems in preparation for longer-duration missions far from Earth. In addition to demonstrating the safe operation of the integrated SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft, the agency is also looking to build a crew tended spaceport in lunar orbit within the first few missions that would serve as a gateway to deep space and the lunar surface. This deep space gateway would have a power bus, a small habitat to extend crew time, docking capability, an airlock, and serviced by logistics modules to enable research. The propulsion system on the gateway mainly uses high power electric propulsion for station keeping and the ability to transfer among a family of orbits in the lunar vicinity. The three primary elements of the gateway, the power and propulsion bus and habitat module, and a small logistics module(s), would take advantage of the cargo capacity of SLS and crewed deep space capability of Orion. An airlock can further augment the capabilities of the gateway and can fly on a subsequent exploration mission, Building the deep space gateway will allow engineers to develop new skills and test new technologies that have evolved since the assembly of the International Space Station. The gateway will be developed, serviced, and utilized in collaboration with commercial and international partners.
Lunar Space Station
“I envision different partners, both international and commercial, contributing to the gateway and using it in a variety of ways with a system that can move to different orbits to enable a variety of missions,” said William Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “The gateway could move to support robotic or partner missions to the surface of the moon, or to a high lunar orbit to support missions departing from the gateway to other destinations in the solar system.” Deep Space Transport The second phase of missions will confirm that the agency’s capabilities built for humans can perform long duration missions beyond the moon. For those destinations farther into the solar system, including Mars, NASA envisions a deep space transport spacecraft. This spacecraft would be a reusable vehicle that uses electric and chemical propulsion and would be specifically designed for crewed missions to destinations such as Mars. The transport would take crew out to their destination, return them back to the gateway, where it can be serviced and sent out again. The transport would take full advantage of the large volumes and mass that can be launched by the SLS rocket, as well as advanced exploration technologies being developed now and demonstrated on the ground and aboard the International Space Station. This second phase will culminate at the end of the 2020s with a one year mission in the lunar vicinity to validate the readiness of the system to travel beyond the Earth-moon system to Mars and other destinations, and build confidence that long-duration, distant human missions can be safely conducted with independence from Earth. Through the efforts to build this deep space infrastructure, this phase will enable explorers to identify and pioneer innovative solutions to technical and human challenges discovered or engineered in deep space. To achieve the agency’s goal to extend humanity’s presence in the solar system will require the best research, technologies and capabilities from international partners and the private sector. NASA will look to partners for potential contributions of spaceflight hardware and the delivery of supplemental resources. The gateway and transport could potentially support mission after mission as a hub of activity in deep space near the moon, representing multiple countries and agencies with partners from both government and private industry. NASA is open to new ideas of both a technical and programmatic nature suggestions as we develop, mature and implement this plan. Related links: Journey to Mars: https://www.nasa.gov/topics/journeytomars/index.html Orion Spacecraft: https://www.nasa.gov/exploration/systems/orion/index.html Space Launch System (SLS): https://www.nasa.gov/exploration/systems/sls/index.html Image, Text, Credits: NASA/Kathryn Hambleton. Greetings, Orbiter.ch Full article
It’s a long ways down. This is a view from the vantage point of astronaut Shane Kimbrough during his spacewalk last Friday outside the International Space Station. Shane posted this photo and wrote, “ View of our spectacular planet (and my boots) during the #spacewalk yesterday with @Thom_astro.” During the spacewalk with Kimbrough and Thomas Pesquet of ESA, which lasted just over six-and-a-half hours, the two astronauts successfully disconnected cables and electrical connections to prepare for its robotic move Sunday, March 26.
Two astronauts will venture outside the space station again this Thursday, March 30 for the second of three spacewalks. Kimbrough and Flight Engineer Peggy Whitson will begin spacewalk preparation live on NASA Television starting at 6:30 a.m. EST, with activities beginning around 8 a.m. Watch live online here.
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NASA’s Hybrid Computer Enables Raven’s Autonomous Rendezvous Capability
ISS - International Space Station patch. March 21, 2017 A hybrid computing system developed at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, is the enabling technology behind an ambitious experiment testing a relative navigation and autonomous docking capability known as Raven.
Image above: This panorama of the International Space Station was composed by piecing together images taken by Raven’s Visible Camera. These images were processed by a hybrid computing platform, SpaceCube 2.0. Image Credit: NASA. Developed by the Satellite Servicing Projects Division, or SSPD, the carry-on luggage-sized module was launched February 19 aboard SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft, along with other experiments deployed outside the International Space Station on an experiment pallet. Raven is testing and maturing visible, infrared and lidar sensors and machine-vision algorithms; the module will bring NASA one step closer to realizing the groundbreaking autopilot capability that can be applied to many NASA missions for decades to come. Since NASA’s pre-Apollo days, the agency has successfully docked spacecraft while they speed through space. However, all operations involved humans who orchestrated the movements from the ground. Raven’s objective is to develop and mature technologies that ultimately will relieve human dependency and give spacecraft the ability to catch up with one another and dock autonomously in real time. “The Raven module is equipped with technology that lays the foundation for a relative navigation system,” said Goddard Director Christopher Scolese. “What some may not fully appreciate is the fact that Raven’s sensors could not do their job if it weren’t for another very effective technology called SpaceCube. The SpaceCube processor is the behind-the-scenes technology that is making this important demonstration possible.” SpaceCube is a reconfigurable, very fast flight computing platform that Goddard technologists first demonstrated during a relative navigation experiment on the Hubble Servicing Mission-4 in 2009. During the Raven experiment, the module’s “sensors serve as the eyes. SpaceCube acts as the brain, analyzing data and telling components what to do,” said Ben Reed, deputy division director of SSPD. The “eyes” and the “brain” together create the autopilot capability. Since its initial development, SpaceCube has evolved into a family of flight computers all distinguished by their computing speed, which is 10 to 100 times faster than the commonly used spaceflight processor — the RAD750. Though the RAD750 is immune to the adverse effects of radiation, it is slow and many generations behind the computing speed of commercial processors. SpaceCube processors achieve their data-crunching prowess because Goddard technologists married radiation-tolerant integrated circuits, which are programmed to execute specific computing jobs simultaneously, with algorithms that detect and fix radiation-induced upsets in collected data. Consequently, these hybrid systems are nearly as reliable as the RAD750, yet orders-of-magnitude faster, capable of executing complex computations once limited to ground-based systems.
Image above: This image shows the Defense Department’s experiment pallet, STP-H5, hanging at the end of Canada’s robotic arm during installation on the outside of the International Space Station. Image Credit: NASA. During its two-year stay on the space station, Raven will sense incoming and outgoing visiting space station spacecraft, feeding the data it “sees” to SpaceCube 2.0, one in the family of SpaceCube products. SpaceCube then runs a set of pose algorithms, or a set of instructions, to gauge the relative distance between Raven and the spacecraft it is tracking. Then, based on these calculations, SpaceCube 2.0 autonomously sends commands that swivel the Raven module on its gimbal or pointing system to keep the sensors trained on the vehicle, while continuing to track it. While all this is transpiring, NASA operators on the ground monitor Raven’s technologies, paying close attention to how they function as a system and making necessary adjustments to increase Raven’s tracking abilities. “Tracking spacecraft with this system is only possible because we have SpaceCube,” said SSPD Avionics Technology Lead and SpaceCube Lead Engineer David Petrick, who has won prestigious awards for his work on the processor. “This type of operation requires fast computing.” Raven’s foundational technologies will be applied to future missions. For example, Restore-L, which also will use SpaceCube 2.0, will rendezvous with, grasp, refuel and relocate Landsat 7 when it launches in 2020. SpaceCube 2.0, however, isn’t the only processor now at work on the space station’s external experiment pallet sponsored by the Department of Defense’s Space Technology Program. SpaceCube 1.0 is being used as the communication interface between the space station’s data services and multiple experiments on the pallet. In addition, a miniaturized version of SpaceCube 2.0 — the SpaceCube Mini — is operating two NASA and U.S. Defense Department experiments. NASA also is testing two other miniature computers, developed with the University of Florida. These models are mostly equipped with commercial parts. For other technology news, go to https://gsfctechnology.gsfc.nasa.gov/newsletter/Current.pdf Related links: Raven: https://sspd.gsfc.nasa.gov/Raven.html SpaceCube: https://spacecube.gsfc.nasa.gov/ Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center/Lori Keesey/Lynn Jenner. Greetings, Orbiter.ch Full article
After spending a month attached to the ISS, the Dragon spacecraft succesfully lands in the pacific and is shipped back to land.
via reddit
SpaceX Dragon Spacecraft Departs Space Station
SpaceX - CRS-10 Dragon Mission patch. March 19, 2017
Image above: The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft was released from space station at 5:11 a.m. ET on March 19 after delivering more than 5,500 pounds of cargo. Image Credit: NASA TV. Expedition 50 astronauts Thomas Pesquet of ESA (European Space Agency) and Shane Kimbrough of NASA released the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft from the International Space Station‘s robotic arm at 5:11 a.m. EDT.
U.S. Commercial Cargo Ship Departs the International Space Station
With the spacecraft a safe distance from the station, SpaceX flight controllers in Hawthorne, California, will command its deorbit burn around 10 a.m. The capsule will splash down at about 10:54 a.m. in the Pacific Ocean, where recovery forces will retrieve the capsule and its more than 5,400 pounds of cargo. The cargo includes science samples from human and animal research, external payloads, biology and biotechnology studies, physical science investigations and education activities. The deorbit burn and splashdown will not be broadcast on NASA TV.
Image above: Image above: The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft released (Archive image). Image Credit: NASA. NASA and the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), the non-profit organization that manages research aboard the U.S. national laboratory portion of the space station, will receive time-sensitive samples and begin working with researchers to process and distribute them within 48 hours of splashdown. Dragon, the only space station resupply spacecraft able to return to Earth intact, launched Feb. 19 on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from historic Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and arrived at the station Feb. 23 for the company’s 10th NASA-contracted commercial resupply mission. Related links: Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS): http://www.iss-casis.org/ NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html SpaceX: https://www.nasa.gov/spacex Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html Images (mentioned), Video (NASA TV), Text, Credits: NASA/Hayley Fick. Best regards, Orbiter.ch Full article
What is an upcoming project/mission you're most excited for?
It is likely that I’ll be assigned a mission to the International Space Station (ISS) within the next few years. We’ve had a continuous presence on the Space Station for 17 years now, along with our international partners (Russian Space Agency, European Space Agency, Japanese Space Agency, and Canadian Space Agency). Missions on the ISS typically last 6 months. I’m incredibly excited to contribute to the impressive array of scientific experiments that we are conducting every day on ISS (I am a scientist after all!), and very much look forward to the potential of going for a spacewalk and gaining that perspective of gazing down on the fragile blue ball that is our home from above. Beyond that, being part of test missions on the Orion spacecraft (currently under construction at NASA!) would be an extraordinary opportunity. The current NASA plan is to send astronauts in Orion in a mission that will go 40,000 miles beyond the Moon in the early 2020s, reaching a distance further than that ever travelled by humans. I’d certainly be game for that!
My question is, is the IDA going to be a standard for spacecraft? Do we have standard ports already?
Spacewalk Friday: Installing a New "Parking Spot" on Station
This Friday, Aug. 19, two U.S. astronauts will install a new gateway for American commercial crew spacecraft at the International Space Station.
Commercial crew flights from Florida’s Space Coast to the International Space Station will restore America’s human spaceflight launch capability and increase the time U.S. crews can dedicate to scientific research.
The adapter being installed (imaged below) was launched on a SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft and arrived on orbit July 20. This ring is known as an International Docking Adapter, or IDA, and its main purpose is to provide a port for spacecraft bringing astronauts to the station in the future. Outfitted with a host of sensors and systems, the adapter is built so spacecraft systems can automatically perform all the steps of arrival and docking with the station without input from the astronauts.
NASA astronauts Jeff Williams and Kate Rubins will perform the spacewalk to install the equipment this Friday, Aug. 19. This will be the fourth spacewalk in Williams’ career and the first for Rubins.
Four previous spacewalks…like the one below…helped set the stage for installation of this docking adapter. During those previous spacewalks, other crew members laid hundreds of feet of power and data cables outside the space station.
On Wednesday, the robotics team using the Canadarm2 and its attached “Dextre” manipulator, will reach into the SpaceX Dragon trunk and pull out the docking adapter and position it for Friday’s spacewalk activities.
The morning of the spacewalk, while the astronauts are getting suited up, the robotic arm will position the docking adaptor near the port so that it will be ready for installation.
The two astronauts will venture outside the space station to install the first International Docking Adapter (IDA). This new adapter port will provide a parking space for U.S. Commercial Crew vehicles.
Watch LIVE!
Coverage of the spacewalk begins at 6:30 a.m. EDT on Friday, Aug. 19; with the spacewalk scheduled to begin at 8:05 a.m. EDT. Stream live online HERE.
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Earth Art: Out of Africa
The International Space Station’s altitude of about 250 statue miles overlooking the Earth provides a unique vantage point from which I’m able to view our world. Capturing geographical spots for Earth scientific observations is often part of my job here aboard our orbital laboratory. The images from space provide researchers on Earth with key data to better understand the planet.
But photography in space is also an enjoyable hobby. It helps to add some semblance of life balance on the scale of work and life. When you live at work for a year, this balance is very important.
The view across Earth has given me some incredible scenes. But I have most enjoyed photographing Earth with a different eye. Through a zoom lens and with the vantage point of the space station and the ever-interesting canvas of Earth, I’ve produced a series of Earth Art. Some of the most inhospitable places on Earth are also some of the most beautiful from space. The African continent is no exception.
I recently took this wall-worthy art photo located on the western edge of the Sahara desert at center Mauritania in Northwest Africa. There is a giant quartzite circle called Richat Structure. It is approximately 24 miles across. This volcanic bulge that never erupted and was leveled by erosion makes for interesting Earth Art.
Traveling at 17,500 mph around the globe for nearly a year, I’ve had many opportunities to capture several abstract glimpses of Africa. Here are some of them. Enjoy!
My favorite Astronaut joined Tumblr, beware, the pictures are flooding in now!
Chasing Storms at 17,500mph
Flying 250 miles above the Earth aboard the International Space Station has given me the unique vantage point from which to view our planet. Spending a year in space has given me the unique opportunity to see a wide range of spectacular storm systems in space and on Earth.
The recent blizzard was remarkably visible from space. I took several photos of the first big storm system on Earth of year 2016 as it moved across the East Coast, Chicago and Washington D.C. Since my time here on the space station began in March 2015, I’ve been able to capture an array of storms on Earth and in space, ranging from hurricanes and dust storms to solar storms and most recently a rare thunder snowstorm.
Blizzard 2016
Hurricane Patricia 2015
Hurricane Joaquin 2015
Dust Storm in the Red Sea 2015
Dust Storm of Gobi Desert 2015
Aurora Solar Storm 2015
Aurora Solar Storm 2016
Thunderstorm over Italy 2015
Lightning and Aurora 2016
Rare Thunder Snowstorm 2016
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.@astro_tim and @StationCDRKelly primed and ready for their spacewalk yesterday pic.twitter.com/4nl8rKWURI
— Tim Peake (@astro_timpeake) December 22, 2015
Earth Art
The Southern tip of #India and its blue waters. #YearInSpace pic.twitter.com/mwnztcWMLG
— Scott Kelly (@StationCDRKelly) January 3, 2016
(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ec15AZ1-Q1I)
or how to park your car in space :D