Becoming an astronaut is a fairly romanticized career path, but there are a lot of less-than-romantic aspects to working 50 miles or more above the Earth’s surface. Case in point: just being in zero G makes the human body do all sorts of embarrassing things.
A new story from the New York Times exhaustedly points out that living in space comes with all sorts of “bodily indignities” which should give even the most eager potential space explorer pause. It turns out, it’s not just deadly radiation or muscle loss due to weightlessness astronauts traveling to spots in our own solar system will have to put with:
In microgravity, however, the blood volume above your neck will most likely still be too high, at least for a while. This can affect the eyes and optic nerves, sometimes causing permanent vision problems for astronauts who stay in space for months, a condition called spaceflight-associated neuro-ocular syndrome. It also causes fluid to accumulate in nearby tissues, giving you a puffy face and congested sinuses. As with a bad cold, the process inhibits nerve endings in the nasal passages, meaning you can’t smell or taste very well. (The nose plays an important role in taste.) The I.S.S. galley is often stocked with wasabi and hot sauce.
These sensory deficits can be helpful in some respects, though, because the I.S.S. tends to smell like body odor or farts. You can’t shower, and microgravity prevents digestive gases from rising out of the stew of other juices in your stomach and intestines, making it hard to belch without barfing. Because the gas must exit somehow, the frequency and volume (metric and decibel) of flatulence increases.
Other metabolic processes are similarly disturbed. Urine adheres to the bladder wall rather than collecting at the base, where the growing pressure of liquid above the urethra usually alerts us when the organ is two-thirds full. “Thus, the bladder may reach maximum capacity before an urge is felt, at which point urination may happen suddenly and spontaneously,” according to “A Review of Challenges & Opportunities: Variable and Partial Gravity for Human Habitats in L.E.O.,” or low Earth orbit. This is a report that came out last year from the authors Ronke Olabisi, an associate professor of biomedical engineering at the University of California, Irvine, and Mae Jemison, a retired NASA astronaut. Sometimes the bladder fills but doesn’t empty, and astronauts need to catheterize themselves.
Giant spinning ring stations are sounding more and more appealing
Seems like human bodies didn’t evolve - surprisingly - to handle 0g.
It’s a small wonder that people can travel into space at all. I mean, the problem is hard enough already for us squishy humans, but just imagine how much worse it would be if we were merpeople… Air’s about 1.2kg/m^3 at sea level; liquid water is about 1000kg/m^3! Or, if we were the size and weight of blue whales? We’d probably never get off the planet – let alone to the moon.
What a stroke of luck we did our testing with chimps and not blue whales.
blue whales might find fire a higher hurdle
That didn’t quite go in the direction I was expecting.
edit: also probably said by astronauts.
Definitely said by astronauts.
From the other article I linked:
But not every specimen was dealt with cleanly. During the Apollo 10 mission in 1969, astronaut Tom Stafford suddenly said: “Get me a napkin quick. There’s a turd floating through the air.”
“I didn’t do it. It ain’t one of mine," astronaut John Young said, according to a NASA transcript.
💀
How does one take a shit? I’m imagining a vacuum tube up the bum?
In fact, astronaut Alan Shepard — the first American in space — was forced to pee his pants on the launchpad in 1961.
NASA quickly realized that the lack of bathroom planning presented a messy problem, but solutions weren’t easy. A variety of makeshift solutions were sent into space over the years, including pee bags, roll on “cuffs,” diapers, toilet seats with straps, and $19 million commodes.
After the Apollo missions ended in 1975, engineers described defecation and urination as the “bothersome aspects of space travel.” However, contraptions for “going” while weightless have gotten a little more comfortable since then, and astronauts are now generally good at keeping waste from floating around.
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“After defecation, the crewmember was required to seal the bag and knead it in order to mix a liquid bactericide with the contents to provide the desired degree of feces stabilization,” NASA said. “Because this task was distasteful and required an inordinate amount of time, low-residue foods and laxatives were generally used prior to launch.”
NASA even has a log of all the individual poops collected on the Apollo missions.
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After they relieved themselves, the men aboard Skylab had to vacuum-dry their feces with heat so that they could be dumped into the waste tank or studied.
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The toilet system still wasn’t that easy to use — the opening was less than 4 inches wide, about a quarter of the size of a regular toilet hole. Astronauts had to be toilet trained on Earth first, and some test runs even included a special under-the-seat camera so they could perfect their aim.
“Alignment is important,” NASA’s Scott Weinstein, who taught space crews how to use the shuttle toilet, said in a video.
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Today, astronauts at the International Space Station poop into a little plate-sized toilet hole, and a fan vacuum-sucks their excrement away.
It’s actually fascinating, though gross. That article goes into excruciating detail.
Thanks!
NASA even has a log of all the individual poops collected on the Apollo missions.
Pun intended?
Nope, just a big log, all of the poo collected and packed together.
“After it starts getting full,” she said of the toilet, “you have to put a rubber glove on and pack it down.”
Okay maybe I’m glad I’m too tall to be an astronaut
Business insider, wherever people do their business, we have it covered!
More reasons not to go to space. Thanks.
Still worth it, IMO.
