Program Information

Series: Destination Tomorrow
Program: Episode 17
Segment Number: 3 (Watch entire program)
Duration: 00:09:33
Year Produced: 2005
Description:

Third segment of episode 17 that contains the How it Works segment in which Astronaut Michael Foale describes what eating in space is like.

NASA's Destination Tomorrow™ is a series of 30-minute programs that focus on NASA research. Each exciting program gives the audience an inside look at NASA and demonstrates how research and technology relate to our everyday lives.

For more information visit: http://destination.larc.nasa.gov/

Transcript

Many of us have only dreamed
of going to space,
but only a few
of the best and brightest
have actually had
the opportunity.

But an even smaller
amount
have spent long periods
of time there.

The experiments and data
collected from these pioneers
is helping scientists
and future astronauts
learn more about the effects
of long-duration missions
on the human body.

One of these pioneers that has
spent significant time in space
helping lead the way
is astronaut Michael Foale.

A veteran of six space flights,
Foale is credited
with four space walks
totaling almost 23 hours.

He's also spent time on both
the Russian space station Mir
and was the commander
of Expedition 8
aboard the international
space station.

He currently holds the U.S.
record for time spent in space
at 374 days,
11 hours, and 19 minutes.

So who better to help us
understand what it's like
to actually live
and eat in space?

Johnny Alonso spoke
with Dr. Foale
to find out How It Works.

(Alonso)
The international space station
is without doubt
one of the most amazing
structures ever built.

Orbiting Earth
some 242 miles above us,
its stated goal is to teach us
how to live in space
for long periods of time.

Although there are many areas
of scientific study
being researched,
one of the most important
is food technology.

Understanding
how the human body
interacts with food
in microgravity
will be one of several
key questions
that need to be answered
when we travel
outside of Earth's orbit
for long periods of time.

Who better to ask
about food in space
than an astronaut
who's spent over a year
on both the ISS and the Mir,
eating a variety
of different foods?

Astronaut Mike Foale
will give us the skinny
on what it's like
to live in space
and to find out
How It Works.

Eating in space is a...a treat.

Basically, you get hungry;
you get thirsty,
just like we do on Earth.

I think
after the first day in space,
when you get launched in space,
your stomach lifts up
a little bit as you float.

And so for the very first hours
after arrival in space,
there isn't a desire to eat.

And that is because you're
fighting some vestibular issues,
some nausea, but those pass,
and they pass pretty quickly--
in my case,
two or three hours.

After about two orbits--
an orbit is 1 1/2 hours,
90 minutes.

After about two or three orbits,
you're starting to get ready
to take off your space suit
that you used
to launch into space.

On my last flight,
it was on a Soyuz rocket.

You get out of this cramped
space, stretch out.

You change clothes
into something soft,
not this bulky,
awkward space suit.

And then you think
about eating.

There are many types of fare--
food fare, I mean--in space.

On the Soyuz rocket,
which has probably
the most meager food cuisine
I've come across
in my career--

The Soyuz simply has
dried foods and juices.

This food is really not made
for a real meal.

However, it's enough
to get us by
for the two days it takes
to get to the international
space station.

[man over intercom]
I have a turkey with cranapple
and cranberry sauce.

(Foale)
You get to the space station
after two days,
and, oh, it's a wonderful,
wonderful sight
because you know not only
there are friends there;
there's more places
to stretch out and move about,
big windows, but there's also
food, real food,
and they're talking to you
about it, you know?

They're saying, "Hey,
what shall we put on for you?"

And the first thing
that came to my mind was,
I remembered my experience
of Russian foods and American
foods that we shared 50/50.

This is where
we keep our food.

The red boxes
are Russian food.

The blue boxes
are American food.

Why do we have
so few American boxes?

Now, that's a good question.

I'm not sure what
I'm going to have tonight,
but I think
it's going to be American.

Ah. Look.

"Chocolate pudding cake."

Not sure I want that
just yet.

All right.

None of them.

Let's try something else.

One of the worst things
to eat in space,
but they still keep sending it,
both Americans and
Russians--they send crackers.

And you eat crackers,
and they go...

And you have all these crumbs
flying out,
and the whole issue is
to somehow put the cracker
into your mouth
and then sort of seal
your lips around it
and then crunch on it
so the crumbs don't explode
out of your mouth.

Tell me, does food in space
taste differently
than it does here on Earth?

The whole issue
of taste in space
is one of,
I think, research.

In my personal experience,
I don't believe
my sensation of taste
really changes in space.

I did notice on my first
long-duration flight
on the space station Mir,
over time, I started to want
or crave salty foods more.

So, Mike,
when it's time to eat,
do you guys, you know,
all get together at a table,
or do you sit by yourself?

What's the procedure?

Well, the most important thing
I think anybody does
in a day is eat.

And what do we do?

We're social creatures,
human beings.

And we like to eat together.

And that's where
social events normally occur
is around food or drink.

Same is true in space.

And as the commander of
the international space station,
I understood very, very clearly
that I was not going to let us--
just two of us for most of the
time, Sasha Kaleri and myself--
eat at different times.

'Cause then we would start
to come apart.

We wouldn't understand it.

There wouldn't be
the exchange.

It would just be
very, very poor.

It's hard enough
living for 6 1/2 months
in a small space
with only one other person,
far away from everybody else.

So I said, "Sasha,
we're going to have breakfast.

"We're gonna have
"maybe, you know,
a coffee break about 11:00.

"Then we're gonna go to lunch.

"And we're gonna have
fixed lunch,
"and we're not gonna let
the ground bother us,
"and we're gonna make it clear
to the ground
"we don't want to be bothered.

"Then we're gonna go to tea
at about, like, 4:00.

Then we go to evening meal
at about 7:00."

And sure enough,
we then got this routine going.

This is a good example
of a space shuttle tray,
not often used simply because
the tray really is designed
to hold your food.

Now, here in front of you,
it's very convenient for me
to hold the implements that I
would use to talk about eating.

But actually, on
the international space station
or indeed on the space shuttle,
there's so much
Velcro patches around
that you can always use the same
food implements or items
to simply stick your food
to whatever Velcro is near you.

Any wall, any surface generally
has some Velcro nearby,
and it attaches just
with a little Velcro circle.

They always make a point
on this space station
or on the space shuttle
to have hook Velcro on the items
that you would attach,
and they always have pile Velcro
on the walls.

Pile is softer.

It doesn't scratch the skin,
for one thing,
so it's just more comfortable
to be around everywhere.

And then you make hook Velcro
the stuff that's just kind of
small and specific.

And so I'm holding right here
minestrone soup.

And notice, there's a bar code.

There's also soup minestrone,
which is in Russian.

And I read that for you.

The bar code is used
in the case that we have to do
any food logging experiments.

They know exactly
how many calories,
what the food value is
of this packet,
and we have food specialists
who know exactly what's in this:
all the vitamins,
all the calories,
fats, et cetera,
and cholesterols.

If we're going to drink water,
for example,
we would still log it,
even though
there's no calories in it.

We would scan the packet,
and we'd fill it
with the right amount of water.

So we've been talking
about all this food.

I mean, how do you control
your weight in orbit?

Obviously, you eat more,
or you eat less,
and your weight will change.

In space, the initial reaction,
the first two days
is for you to go
to the toilet a lot,
and you lose a lot of fluids.

You probably lose
five to ten pounds
just in the first two days
just through fluid loss.

And a lot of the fluid's
coming from your legs.

It's also shifting
up into your upper body.

And that's why, when you see
people on television from space,
they kind of have
slightly puffed-up cheeks.

I do believe
we actually lose
that fluid shift
somewhat in our faces
because we've basically
just lost fluid.

So that's a change in the body,
and so you have lost weight
at that point.

And we measure our mass
every two weeks.

And the first month
of my flight,
we talked
to our flight surgeons,
our doctors, every week
about how things are going,
and generally, it's always,
"How are you doing?" you know.

"Nothing's wrong," et cetera.

They want us to eat enough
so that our mass,
our weight on Earth,
stays the same.

And they know that
when you come back to Earth,
those astronauts--and we've had
many different types of flight,
many different cases--
those astronauts that have not
kept their weight on orbit
but have lost weight
do very poorly
recovering on Earth.

They don't get their fluids
back into the body quick enough.

They aren't strong enough
to move around easily.

So I was being told by my
flight surgeon, "Mike, eat."

And I went, "Yes, I will!"

So it was simply
a license to eat.

So that's how it works.

So if you're into
really expensive take-out,
I got the stuff for you.

Mm, minestrone.

That's all for this edition
of NASA's Destination Tomorrow.

I'm Kera O'Bryon.

For all of us here at NASA,
we'll see you next time.

Virginia Standards

6th Grade SOLs » Science » 6.8
7th Grade SOLs » Science » LS.4
9th Grade SOLs » Science » ES.4