SpaceX Crew-5 Astronauts Reflect On Their Time In Orbit
NASA's Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, Japan's Koichi Wakata and cosmonaut Anna Kikina talk to Space.com's Elizabeth Howell from the International Space Station. -- Auroras, spacecraft mods and more: SpaceX Crew-5 astronauts reflect on their time in orbit.
Credit NASA
Credit NASA
Category
🤖
TechTranscript
00:00 Next up we have Elizabeth Howell with Space.com. Liz.
00:03 Hello, thank you. Maybe this is for Nicole.
00:07 Trying to get Frank into that crew drag must have been one of the most interesting applications of just-in-time training.
00:14 Can you talk about how you and the rest of the crew and of course Frank got that scenario together? Thanks.
00:20 Well, it was really the teams at NASA and SpaceX that worked very closely to come up with a plan quite quickly so that we can safely add a seat to Dragon and return Frank.
00:37 Josh actually put the seat liner in Dragon, so do you want to talk to that, Blue?
00:42 Yeah, absolutely. And Dan, if you could help us out, if you could mute while we're answering because we're getting a bit of an echo up here.
00:48 But yeah, Frank and I worked together to install that and it was really cool to work with Aki.
00:55 Aki, who had obviously been on crew two, was on the ground and had gone through the whole procedure when he was out at Hawthorne and so we were able to work very closely with him.
01:06 There were a couple of differences as we were putting the wrenches in place.
01:11 We had some clearance issues that weren't apparent at Hawthorne. We worked through it and got Frank a great little seat that I actually wouldn't mind riding in too.
01:21 It looks pretty comfy down there. And he doesn't have to hear us talk. He doesn't have a headset in that case.
01:27 So he's not going to hear us running our mouths up there in our seats.
01:31 All right, we're getting to some follow-ups now. Let's go back to Elizabeth Howell with Space.com. Liz?
01:41 Thanks for finding me again. Koichi, can you talk about your new colleagues, the two new Japanese astronauts that have been selected and your feelings about the program going forward? Thank you.
01:52 Yeah, it's really exciting to hear the news. On Tuesday I saw the news of the Yoneda-san and Suwa-san selected.
02:04 Very capable and very interesting background and I really look forward to working with them.
02:10 This is the best timing. 15 years ago in March, the Japanese first module was launched to the Space Station
02:16 and the government of Japan has decided to join the extension of the Space Station.
02:22 And also we are working with partners for the lunar missions and the Gatebreak Program.
02:26 So for them, they have plenty of opportunities in the low-Earth orbit as well as for the moon exploration.
02:32 So I feel very envious, but I would like to convey what I have experienced as an astronaut
02:39 and I would like to support them for their training as well as for their space flight.
02:47 All right, we're going to switch over to some social questions now.
02:50 Reminder for reporters, press star 1 if you're on the phone bridge to get into the queue.
02:54 The first one from Elaine on Twitter wanted to know if anybody in Crew 5 saw any of those outrageous auroras over the past couple nights.
03:10 Okay, so Monday morning I headed into Node 3, which is where our restroom is, but also where the beautiful cupola is.
03:20 And it was really dark in there and I was about to take care of some business that we have to do up here
03:26 as astronauts doing different samples and it's kind of a miserable process.
03:29 And it was really dark and then I heard this little voice down hanging in the cupola and Duke says, "Blue, you've got to see this."
03:38 And I came down and we just soaked it all in on Monday morning,
03:43 feeling a little guilty that we weren't in a position that we had the words to describe what we were seeing.
03:50 It was really remarkable.
03:51 We were over North America, very northern part, at the maximum latitude that we can get.
03:59 And so on Tuesday we took advantage of an opportunity.
04:03 We had a half day and Duke can talk to you about it, but we got set up on a time lapse
04:08 and we got some pretty amazing photography. We were giddy yesterday when we saw it.
04:13 It was really fun.
04:14 Koichi's done a lot of time lapse, so he had that expertise and Josh got it all focused and set up.
04:20 And I think we took maybe three night passes worth of photography.
04:24 It was just incredible.
04:26 But yeah, I woke up that morning just early and thought I'd spend some time in the cupola,
04:30 maybe soaking in some of those last nighttime views before we depart, and I couldn't believe the aurora.
04:36 The coolest thing to me is that as the sun rose, you could still see the northern lights.
04:42 And so you get all those amazing colors of the sunrise, the deep red to the orange to the blue,
04:48 but you could still see the green of the aurora.
04:50 And I have a friend, Amy, that lives in Alaska.
04:52 I happened to talk to her on Tuesday and she mentioned this incredible northern lights that she saw.
04:58 And she said, you know, if Alaskans are talking about the northern lights, it's got to be good.
05:02 So she sent pictures from Earth and we sent her pictures from space.
05:05 pictures from space. It was pretty special.