Discovery of space in a year

NASA’s Scott Kelly lived 340 consecutive days in the International Space Station between 2015 and 2016, the longest time in zero gravity spent by a US astronaut at that time. Kelly during his exploration carried Alfred Lansing’s book on Ernest Shackleton on board the ISS to read when the isolation of space starts to bother him and to remind him other explorers also faced danger, loneliness, uncertainty, and fear.

Kelly said after looking down at planet earth from 200 miles in space, “I feel as though I know the earth in an intimate way most people don’t – the coastlines, terrains, mountains, and rivers.”

 He saw a borderless world, but “some parts blanketed in pollution that they appear sick, in need of treatment, or at least a chance to heal.” Space has a smell “slightly burned, slightly metallic” like the smell of fireworks. Kelly’s life in space with zero degrees is a constant challenge, as he has to deal with burning eyes and congestion from carbon dioxide, went for dumpster diving for discarded meals after a supply capsule was destroyed, and also cleaned up a gallon of urine mixed with acid in a toilet mishap.

He shared the space station with a Russian cosmonaut, Mikhail Kornienko, and other crew members on shifts with mice and fellow creatures participating in a space experiment. Kelly was testing long-term effects of living in zero gravity on human body and mind.  He said, “I have learned following the news from space can make the Earth seem like a swirl of chaos and conflict, and that seeing the environmental degradation caused by humans is heartbreaking.”

Kelly a veteran of four spaceflights and the American record holder for consecutive days spent in space, takes us inside a sphere utterly hostile to human life, by navigating the extreme challenge of long-term spaceflight,  traveling at 17, 000 miles per hour.

Endurance: A Year In Space, A lifetime of Discovery by Scott Kelly, Penguin Random House £20, Doubleday $29.95, 400 pages.