When chemical engineer Don Pettit, age 69, blasts off for the Worldwide Area Station (ISS) this summer season, he’ll turn out to be the second-oldest NASA astronaut in area, after the legendary John Glenn, who spent 9 days onboard the area shuttle Discovery on the age of 77 in 1998. Pettit will spend a full six months in orbit throughout a time of excessive pressure between the U.S. and Russia. Area exploration is one of many few areas through which the 2 international locations nonetheless cooperate, and Pettit, a veteran of three prior missions, is now coaching for ISS Expedition 72 in an space typically known as Star Metropolis on the outskirts of Moscow.
Whereas some astronauts spend their scarce off-duty hours on the ISS with actions reminiscent of studying books, chatting with household again on Earth or browsing the Web, Pettit carves out time for what he calls “science of opportunity.” Throughout a mission in 2003, as an example, his observations of how grains of sugar, salt and low mixture in air-filled plastic luggage allowed him and his fellow scientist and astronaut Stanley Like to serendipitously shed mild on an enigmatic early step of planetary formation. Pettit plans to enterprise into new science-of-opportunity territory on his newest mission, too.
An inveterate tinkerer who spent 12 years at Los Alamos Nationwide Laboratory earlier than becoming a member of the astronaut program, Pettit has devised, amongst different issues, a cup that makes use of floor pressure to permit astronauts to sip espresso in microgravity as if on Earth—for which he and Mark Weislogel of Portland State College had been granted the primary patent for an invention made in area. And he’s an ardent science communicator, having created two video sequence, Saturday Morning Science and Science off the Sphere, that had been filmed on the ISS.
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Pettit and two Russian cosmonauts are slated to carry off on a Soyuz spacecraft from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on September 11.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
You caught the area bug as a child watching John Glenn on the Mercury flights within the early Sixties, and then you definately utilized to the astronaut program proper out of grad faculty. NASA turned you down the primary 3 times. Why did you retain at it?
PETTIT: For a similar cause you retain at any type of exercise or enterprise that takes some time to grasp: you may’t count on to do one thing the primary time and be an knowledgeable at it. NASA invitations in regards to the high 120 in for interviews. After which, the fourth time, I acquired a telephone name that requested if I used to be nonetheless interested by being an astronaut.
You had been onboard the ISS when the area shuttle Columbia broke up throughout reentry into Earth’s environment, killing all seven crew members. How did that have an effect on you mentally?
Three of my classmates had been on that mission, and the opposite 4 crewmates had been actually near my spouse and me. At first there was shock and disbelief. And we needed to compartmentalize this loss and get again to work as a result of we’re driving on a car that wants fixed consideration, and you may’t go off on an emotional bender.
In regular instances, what’s the day by day rhythm on the station?
We’re scheduled for 12 hours a day. There’s normally one other hour, typically two hours, of catch-up work as a result of you may’t get every thing performed. So it’s not unusual for astronauts to common about 13 hours a day, 5 and a half days per week. We’re fortunate if we get sooner or later per week off. You may’t work a gazillion hours on daily basis for six months with out having some off-duty time, and what crews select to do is as much as the person. What recharges my batteries is to reap the benefits of the orbital atmosphere and make observations that you simply can’t do on Earth.
One essential perception you made throughout your off-duty hours was explaining an early step of planetary formation.
How millimeter-sized particles agglomerate into fist-sized objects in [microgravity]—sure.
And from there the sizes proceed to develop—till we’ve full-fledged planets! Has your work on this stood the take a look at of time?
Yeah, it has. Stan Love and I had loads of enjoyable with it. I’ve performed work on this planetary formation idea now on my previous three missions. And I’m planning to make some extra observations on the upcoming mission.
What’s your all-time favourite science-of-opportunity perception?
Oh, gosh! The suite of images that I’ve been capable of do—capturing moments on orbit with compositions and exposures that I actually suppose inform a narrative.
For the upcoming mission, you’re bringing an improved model of your so-called barn-door tracker for area images. Are you able to break down what that’s and what it will probably do?
The unique barn-door tracker [that I made] was constructed from a bunch of junk I discovered on the station, and its goal was to counteract orbital movement and take longish exposures of Earth. It’s actually a easy piece of apparatus that beginner astronomers use: two items of wooden with a piano hinge and a bolt between the 2. You mount the hinge line so it factors in the direction of the North Star. You then put a digicam on one of many platforms. what the thread pitch is, so you may calculate that turning the bolt 1 / 4 of a flip each 5 seconds will transfer the board on the sidereal charge of Earth’s movement. The photographs I took utilizing this barn-door tracker had been actually the primary time we acquired high-resolution photographs of cities at night time.
What enhancements have you ever made to the tracker?
What I’m flying subsequent is a wind-up machine primarily based on a kitchen timer. It is going to scale back the movement in order that the shaft turns one revolution each 90 minutes—that’s the station’s orbital interval. And the station will pitch down at a charge that makes one revolution about its heart of gravity. That approach, the identical facet of the station factors in the direction of Earth because it goes round. This pitch charge is about 4 levels a minute. I made a bit wind-up timer that can transfer a digicam mount on the pitch charge, in order that approach I can do time exposures primarily meant for photos of the celebs. Proper now, due to the pitch charge, you actually can’t make an publicity for much longer than three seconds, or [else] the celebs [will be] blurry. A 3-second publicity simply doesn’t deliver out the dazzle of what you may see along with your eye.
What are you able to see up there that astrophotography photographs fail to seize?
One factor is that if you look out the station window when your eyes are dark-adapted, there are colours of stars that you simply simply can’t discern from Earth.
A composite of a sequence of photographs captured by NASA astronaut Don Pettit utilizing a mounted digicam on the Earth-orbiting Worldwide Area Station, roughly 240 miles above Earth.
Astronauts touring to the ISS take alongside a most well-liked meals package deal and a private medical equipment. How have you ever used this privilege to deliver supplies for private science experiments?
We’ve these drink luggage for espresso or no matter is your favourite beverage. I had the meals individuals pack a few drink luggage with unflavored gelatin. One of many issues I might do is combine a bit little bit of on the spot mashed potato in with the gelatin resolution and let it harden right into a starchy, translucent sphere. From our first help equipment, I put a bit drop of iodine on one facet of this sphere, and also you get to look at the diffusion of the iodine via the gelatin. It appeared prefer it was creating Liesegang buildings, the place you will have concentric logarithmic rings developed via a precipitation course of.
Are you able to give a style of different objects you’re bringing on the upcoming mission?
So there’s sodium chloride on the station. It’s a saturated resolution as a result of a saltshaker wouldn’t work in area. With a colleague in Switzerland, [independent researcher] Pietro Fontana, we’ve printed three peer-reviewed papers on the observations we’ve constructed from crystallizing the galley salt resolution. The most up-to-date paper was in [the Springer Nature journal] npj Microgravity. For the following mission, I’m bringing potassium chloride. We’ve a high-sodium eating regimen on the area station. You would get upwards of 10 to 12 grams of salt a day. So I’m flying this salt substitute in my private meals, and I may even use it for crystallization experiments.
How does your scientific moonlighting mesh with the experiments NASA has you do as a part of your job?
The programmatic experiments are all designed and conceived by individuals who have by no means been in area. They’re good experiments. However up there we give you questions or observations which are utterly totally different than what anyone on Earth may conceive of.
Has a science-of-opportunity perception led to a programmatic experiment?
Perhaps two or three. The qualitative observations that Stan Love and I made confirmed there’s something actually attention-grabbing taking place in particle aggregation in [microgravity]. A college staff proposed and constructed {hardware} to proceed, in a quantifiable approach, this work.
Which Expedition 72 programmatic experiment excites you?
A few of my favourite contain human physiology in an atmosphere we’re not intrinsically meant to be in. Utilizing us as orbital guinea pigs goes to be one of many biggest legacies that come from the area station. Then there are bodily science experiments, many coping with combustion. When you will have combustion in a weightless atmosphere, you don’t get gravity-induced convection. For instance, a standard candle won’t burn as a result of it received’t develop convection. It’ll devour the oxygen round it at a charge that’s sooner than diffusion can present new oxygen. The candle will burn for a handful of seconds after which snuff out.
What does that imply for hearth danger on the station?
We all know sufficient about combustion in a weightless atmosphere to know what sort of supplies you should use and how much supplies you may’t use. For instance, we used to have every kind of Ziploc luggage on the station. However some good engineers on the bottom discovered that polyethylene is approach too flammable to depart out within the open cabin, and they also switched all our luggage to Kynar.
Is a fireplace on the ISS your biggest worry?
That and [depressurization]. You get a bit tiny leak, and perhaps you will have 24 hours to determine how one can plug it. Small leaks should not that huge of a deal. The ugly state of affairs is having a module come unzipped. Consider a soda can that simply goes bloop and explodes and simply turns right into a flat, crinkled piece of sheet steel. You’ve acquired a handful of seconds to determine what to do.
Does that state of affairs ever creep into your ideas on the ISS?
It’s all the time there at the back of your thoughts. We do loads of coaching on the bottom for each [depressurization] and hearth. Tomorrow I’ll be within the simulator, and for that simulation we all know forward of time there’s gonna be a fireplace within the Russian phase of the area station. We’ll need to get in our Soyuz car and do an emergency descent.
What’s the vibe like in Star Metropolis as of late?
A number of the instructors listed below are the identical I had the primary time I got here to Star Metropolis in 1999. We all know one another’s spouses. We all know one another’s kids. Star Metropolis is a small neighborhood, and its sole goal is to coach cosmonauts and astronauts for area flight. So once I come right here, there’s a sure pleasure from being with my Star Metropolis household. My sons had been two years outdated once we first introduced them to Star Metropolis, and one realized to stroll right here.
Are your twin sons interested by following in your footsteps?
They each graduated from Texas A&M [University]. One works at [NASA’s] Johnson Area Middle as an engineer, and one labored for Blue Origin at Kennedy Area Middle.
You’re the oldest energetic astronaut. How do you suppose your physique’s going to carry up on the upcoming mission?
John Glenn went via full shuttle coaching at age 77. He needed to fly in a T-38. He needed to prepare for egress within the water from the shuttle and inflate his life preserver and get within the life raft. He went via it with flying colours. I do the Russian coaching. This final winter we did survival coaching, and if you consider how chilly it may be in Russia, you may think about that that was an ordeal. I did that with my Soyuz crew, so I don’t see any subject with my age on this upcoming mission.
What do you miss in Star Metropolis? Any hobbies?
Effectively, I make home made beer. I like actually hoppy beer. I hate to confess that in virtually two years of coaching for this mission, I haven’t had time to brew a batch.
What recommendation would you give a fellow scientist who needs to turn out to be an astronaut?
Excel in no matter discipline you’re in. Do one thing that sings to your coronary heart and do it nicely. Then maintain making use of to NASA when there are alternatives, and don’t take “no” for a solution!
