Astronauts 🌕 | Weird But True! | S1 E17 | Full Episode | ‪@natgeokids‬

Hey guys, today we're hanging out at Johnson Space Center, finding out what it's like to be an astronaut. This place is crazy cool. Did you know astronauts train for space missions in swimming pools? Did you know tortoises orbited the moon before humans? We're going on a virtual reality space walk. It's time for Weird But True. Guys. Perfect, you're just in time. It seems like there are a million movies coming out these days about astronauts. This is the police. Yeah, like Astro Cops, Planets Away. And what's the one about the space divas? The sastronauts. Yeah, they're like all over the place. And it got us wondering, what is it actually like to be an astronaut? I'm pretty sure they're not busting up space criminals and falling in love with aliens. So our goal is to figure out what it's really like to go on a space mission. So today we're unraveling the world of astronauts. Astronauts. So space. Space. Okay, here we go. So Weird But True, it turns out that humans weren't the first living things from Earth in space. Two dogs, a gray rabbit, 40 mice, two rats, and some fruit flies were passengers on Sputnik 5, a Russian rocket in 1960. And two Russian tortoises were aboard a spacecraft that orbited the moon. Now here's a story about how humans got into space. Perfect. It all started with this guy. His name is Yuri. His story starts way back in 1961 at a Russian spaceport in Kazakhstan. It was a Wednesday and Yuri was nervous. He was focused, calm, collected, a little hungry, but definitely nervous. When the time came, Yuri buckled in and at exactly 6.07 Coordinated Universal Time, the ship's rockets fired. The rocket burst through the atmosphere and into orbit. He spent one hour and 48 minutes in space circling the Earth. Then the rocket pointed downwards and Yuri ejected himself from the capsule, floating safely down to Earth. Yuri Gagarin became the first human ever to venture into outer space and the world was forever changed. And eight years later, it was the United States' turn to make the next big step. With Neil Armstrong in 1969, it was a Sunday and Neil was nervous. He was focused, calm, collected, a little hungry, but definitely nervous. He wasn't in Kazakhstan. He wasn't even on this planet. He was where no man had gone before, the moon. And at exactly 3.56 Coordinated Universal Time, Neil emerged from his capsule. That's one small step for man, one giant leap for man. Neil and his crew returned to Earth in their command module, which landed in the Pacific Ocean using a parachute and there was much pomp and circumstance. Neil Armstrong became the first human ever to walk on the moon and the world was forever changed. And since then, there have been a bunch of other human space headlines too. There have been six more manned missions to the moon and a bunch of other countries hopped aboard the space train with the development of the International Space Station. As of July, 2015, astronaut crews have spent 48,025 days in space. 543 people have flown into orbit, performing 175 total crew days worth of spacewalks and 12 people have walked on the moon. So we know it takes a lot of guts to be an astronaut. Sometimes you gotta do stuff people have never done before, like Neil and Yuri. But we were wondering like, what does an astronaut actually do besides ride in rocket ships? And we found out that there are three different types of astronauts. With different jobs. Which one would you apply for? Well, hi there. Welcome to NASA Job Services. We're so excited. You wanna become an astronaut today. Does being a pilot or a commander interest you? The commander and pilot are responsible for driving the spacecraft. Everything we're working here is awesome, guys. It's kind of like driving a car on the highway, except you're accelerating for eight and a half minutes straight driving a four and a half million pound car. It's actually a spaceship and you're accelerating up to 17,500 miles an hour straight into space. So I guess it's nothing like driving a car on the highway. They also get to use the robotic arm. Fancy, right? Oh my gosh. Weird but true. One time the waste disposal system malfunctioned and a giant pee icicle formed on the side of a space shuttle. True story. The crew had to use the robotic arm to knock it off so they could return home safely. So fun. Too much? Can't handle the machinery? No problem. Maybe you'd like to be our second type of astronaut, a mission specialist. The mission specialist is in charge of planning all crew activities and they also perform spacewalks. This job requires a lot of preparation. Weird but true. This one time mission specialist Luca Parmitano was on a spacewalk and his helmet filled with water. I spilled a lot of water on the back of my head. Where did the cabin come from? This is too much. You couldn't see or hear, but was so well-trained, he made it back to the ship safely. He was very skilled. Too intense? Looking for something else? No worries. We have a third and final astronaut type that might work for you. A payload specialist. These aren't actually NASA astronauts. They're other people. Citizens, scientists, anyone else who's brought onto the shuttle to perform very specific duties like scientific experiments. Weird but true. This guy named Jake Garn even went. He was a U.S. Senator and a mission specialist on the space shuttle Discovery. Senator Garn got so sick during the space flight that there is now a space sickness scale named after him. Space is super awesome, but it's a little tricky to get used to. I guess there are pluses and minuses to the whole thing. Weird things happen in microgravity. Your spine stretches out so you grow like five centimeters taller in space. But don't worry. You go back to regular height when you return. And the zero G makes it so you can't burp. The gases just kind of collect in your intestines. Weird stuff. Well, once you decide you want to apply for the job, just drop your application in our mailbox. Thanks for stopping by. Very neat. So there are three types of astronauts. Commander pilot, mission specialist, and payload specialist. Guys, you know we got to try out some of these jobs, which is going to be a little tough because it's not exactly like we can rent a space shuttle. Yeah, not going to happen, but we can do the next best thing. We can go to Houston. Like Houston. We have a problem. When astronauts call Houston, they're actually calling NASA Mission Control at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. And guys, we're going. We're on our way to the second largest state in the US, known as the Lone Star State. This is where we'll see if we've got what it takes to head into space. Hey guys, we made it. This is the Johnson Space Center. It's where astronauts train, where astronaut-related research happens, and where Mission Control is. We got to find someone to talk to. Let's go. Hi, I'm Charlie. Hello, Charlie. Lucky for us, we ran into Mike Fossum, an astronaut who has logged over 194 days in space. His favorite weird but true fact is his space suit weighs 280 pounds on Earth, but weighs nothing in space. Today, Kirby and I want to figure out what it's really like to be an astronaut. I've been fortunate to fly in space three times. The first two times as a space shuttle crew member, I got to help build the space station as a space walker during those two flights. And then later, I launched on a Russian rocket from Kazakhstan and lived on the space station for half a year. What was it like to launch into space the first time? For the space shuttle Discovery. I was nervous. I was a little bit scared, to tell you the truth. I would be. As the engines came to life, you could feel this big rumble come through the shuttle. And it actually tipped a little bit because the main engines were on an angle, and you felt it move. And then it's coming back up. And I was looking out a window. There's a lot of popping and crackling that you can hear outside. Inside, I don't remember hearing any sound at all. It seems impossible. Maybe it's because my heart was beating so loud. You're excited at the same time you have a job to do. So you're concentrating on the systems, making sure everything's working okay. Standing by for solid rocket booster separation. Separation confirmed. Guidance now converging. Eight minutes, 15 seconds into the flight. Everything looking good on Discovery. Standing by for main engine cutoff. In just eight and a half minutes in, the engines burned out, and we're in orbit. A smooth ride to orbit for the shuttle Discovery embarking on a 13-day mission. Normal daily activities. Tell me how these are different space. How do you take a shower? Well, a space shower is a problem because we can't get the water to find the drain. So we don't have a shower. You use soapy water and a washcloth. And the other one is sleeping. We had a little bedroom. It's about the size of an old-fashioned phone booth. So you have your own little room. You've got your own little room. We use sleeping bags in space. So what was your job on the missions you went up to space in? Main job was really being a space walker. On the first one, we did some special testing outside to see if we could inspect and do repairs to the shuttle's heat shield in case we needed to. And when I went back the next time, the big job was installing a new Japanese-built laboratory to the space station. It was the Kibo Laboratory. Cool. Tell you what, though. We've got the mock-ups of the space station that you can see. We've got the virtual reality lab, which you guys like to see some of that? I think, yeah. Perfect, yeah. Okay. Well, I happen to have a passport book for you right here that's going to get you all over those places. This sounds absolutely perfect, Mike. Learn a bunch, and I'll see you guys in the stars. Awesome. Perfect. Thank you so much. See you later. Mike set us up to make the rounds like astronaut trainees. First up, we're going to the space station. Well, sort of. Welcome everybody to the International Space Station Mock-Up Facility. This is basically a life-size replica of the actual International Space Station. And before we hop inside, let's bring you up to speed on what the ISS is all about. 15 countries are working together on the space station. Weird but true. It's the size of a football field with the living space of a five-bedroom house. This place is huge, and there are a couple of main parts. The truss, the backbone of the system, the solar array wings, giant solar panels, and the pressurized modules where astronauts live. That's the part we're going to check out, the pressurized modules. We're going to take a quick break, and when we get back, we're going to see how astronauts live while in space. We'll see you soon. Weird but true astronaut Neil Armstrong left his space boots on the moon, and they're still there today. Welcome back to the Johnson Space Center. Right now, we're exploring the ISS Mock-Up. It's a replica of the International Space Station. That's where astronauts live while they're in space. Let's go hop inside. The ISS has 14 main pressurized modules divided into two sections, the Russian section and the United States section, although the astronauts share spaces throughout. We're starting here on the Russian half of things in this Vezda service module. If you're a Russian cosmonaut, this is your world right here. This is the Nauka multipurpose laboratory where they do all their super important scientific space research. And if you want to go on a spacewalk, the airlock that they use is over there to the right, the Poisk docking module. If we move through here, this is where the Russian astronauts store their super important science stuff in the Zarya functional cargo block. But Kirby and I are from the United States, so if we were astronauts, we'd be living and working over here in the US orbital segment. The dining room's located here in node one. The bathroom and workout facility are here in the tranquility node. And if you need to go on a spacewalk, you head over here to Quest, the main airlock for US astronauts to enter and exit the space station. Once you finish your spacewalk, you gotta head over here to Destiny, the US research lab. Here they got a giant joystick that lets you control a huge robotic arm. This is where the astronauts spend most of their time doing all their awesome research. And this spot, how cool is that? What's that? Your friends are arriving? Let's go meet them over in node two, aka Harmony. Here's the lab for our friends from the Japanese Aerospace Agency. And the European Space Agency does their research here in the Columbus lab. And at the end of a long day, astronauts on the ISS sleep in these tiny little padded chambers. Weird but true, astronauts have to be tethered when they sleep so they don't float away. Night, Charles. Night, Kirby. All right, guys, so far we got a good idea of what the living quarters are like for an astronaut. But next up, it's time for an equipment demo. Let's go. Here's the plan. I'm gonna complete this simple task, tie a bow with a rope. First, I'm gonna do it at earth pressure and then we're gonna pressure it down to simulated space pressure. We'll see how it goes. Let's give it a go. I can already tell it's gonna be hard. I can barely reach it. It feels like I am wearing a cement suit. It is not similar to anything I've ever felt before. It feels like you're trying to pick up a tiny piece of thread, but your fingers can't find it. So it's so hard for Kirby to move her fingers around because her gloves are pressurized. So think of bending an uncapped water bottle versus bending a capped water bottle. It's much harder to bend a capped one because it's pressurized like the space suit. Now think of each of one of those fingers as their own capped water bottles. Really hard to move around. It's impossible. There's no way. Where's Mike sending us next? Looks like we got the countermeasures room. Cool, cool. Let's go. All right, guys. Inside this ordinary looking building is the countermeasures room. It has all the equipment astronauts use to work out while on their mission. Ready to get ripped, Kirby? You bet. This is the ARED, the Advanced Resistive Exercise Device. It works like a squat or bench press machine, except it doesn't work with any weights because things are weightless in space. This is T2. It's the treadmill that astronauts use aboard the ISS. So Kirby is strapped down to that treadmill so that she can keep on exercising. This is Seavist. Basically like an exercise bike. How does it feel, Kirby? Feeling pretty good. All right, what do we got next today? We got virtual reality. No way. Let's go. Next on our tour, Mike's sending us on a spacewalk. This is it, the virtual reality lab. This is where astronauts go through training to learn how to go on spacewalks. But what exactly is a spacewalk? Basically, anytime an astronaut goes outside in space, that's called a spacewalk. On spacewalks, astronauts do tests on new equipment, make repairs, and perform science experiments. For a while, NASA was developing the manned maneuvering units that allowed the astronauts to float around without being tethered to anything. Nowadays, they're always tethered to the ship or space station. This is where they get to practice spacewalks while here on Earth. And Kirby and I are gonna be able to try it out. Just like real astronauts. After the break, stick around. Weird but true, the longest spacewalk ever was almost nine hours long. Hey guys, welcome back. We're here at the Johnson Space Center Virtual Reality Lab gearing up to go on our first simulated spacewalk. So let's do it. Check it out. It's Earth, Charles. I'm seeing a big old scaffolding of the ISS. The Earth is down this way. And there's Kirby. I see Kirby over here. Hey, Kirby. First high five, high five. Hey. Space high five. This is like way harder than you expect. Kirby, you flipped totally upside down. We're opposite of each other. You can see why they need training because up and down does not exist. So it kind of feels like you're swimming in water. It helps put you kind of in the mindset of what it's like to be in space. Because I'm sitting in a swivel chair right now, but I'm locked onto this pole. I'm not letting go, man. I don't wanna float away. This is nutty. You don't know what's up, what's down. Up and down is the weirdest thing. You gotta know this thing like the back of your hand. It's underwater monkey bars in a fun house being twirled around. That's it. How cool is that, girl? Incredible. And it looks like, according to Mike's itinerary, you saved the best for last. This is gonna be amazing. Let's go. Hey, guys. Hi, I'm Charlie. I'm Lucian. This is Lucian Junkin, senior robotics engineer, who's worked at the NASA Johnson Space Center for more than 15 years. His favorite weird but true fact is astronauts can't whistle in space because there's not enough air to produce a sound. Where are we? What is this thing? This is a space exploration vehicle. It's an off-roading RV for the moon and Mars, and we're at the rock yard where we do a lot of the testing. So it's a mode of transportation. It's a research lab. It's your home for two weeks. It's a tiny vehicle, but it's got a lot going on. You wanna go for a ride? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Come on. Let's do it. So there's no steering wheel. How do you steer this thing? It looks a lot like a helicopter. From that seat, you have to drive the vehicle, but you also have to do a lot of science. That's the magic about astronauts. They can do pretty much everything. That's what makes them really, really special. It looks relatively simple. Let's do it. Lucian got me started, and we're off. Yeah! This is like a moon crater right here that we're driving into. Oh! Stop right there. Perfect. And do a pure right translation. Oh, yeah. It's like we're in a car, but we're going straight right. We're going sideways. Jeez. Do a swivel. We're gonna spin around like merry-go-round. This is nerve-wracking, but you feel confident in the vehicle, don't you? I think it's fun. It's like this thing's got it. No problem. This thing's taking the hills. Are you going up this hill? This one? Don't climb it at all. Let's go, guys. This is so nerve-wracking. Keep going, keep going. Stay committed to your command that you have in. Go, man, go. All right. Okay, stop, stop, stop. Keep an eye on not going over the edge. That's when bad things happen. This is your life support system. Full stick forward. Dude, this truck is a beast. There's nothing this thing can't handle. You see that big triangular rock on the side of the hill? Yeah. Let's go do sights on that. That means creep up to it. Nice. Okay, stop right there. Grim can stick her head in that bubble so she can get a nice close look at some stuff. Pressurized spacesuits don't let you lean down, so you can get closer to rocks in this car, just inches away than you can get in your actual spacesuit. How cool is that? So amazing. That should be in an astronaut movie. After all this astronaut training, we know what it takes to write the real storyline for the next astronaut blockbuster. We gotta head back to HQ to put it all together. Definitely. We'll see you there in a bit. Awesome. We'll see you soon. Weird but true. Apollo 14 astronaut Alan Shepard played golf on the moon. Hey guys, we just got back from an awesome trip to NASA's Johnson Space Center. It was amazing. We learned so much about what it's like for astronauts to be in space. Like payload specialists aren't NASA astronauts. Or that they sleep in these tiny little padded chambers. What else did we learn today? There's so many weird but true things. In space, your spine stretches so you can grow up to five centimeters taller. There's a space sickness scale named after US Senator Garn, a payload specialist who became severely ill while in space. We've been racking our brains over here trying to come up with a storyline for a real astronaut movie. So far, it's pretty awesome. Here's what we got. There's a problem aboard the ISS. A giant pea icicle has formed on the side of Node 2. Causing terrible amounts of damage. NASA's solution? They need a uniquely talented mission specialist to complete the job. Someone with incredible aerial athleticism. Mental strength. And skill. Now we present to you, Ricky Babylon, Space Shredder. This movie's gonna make a billion dollars. We gotta get started on this screenplay. All right guys, it looks like we got a new project on our hands. But thanks so much for stopping by. Come by again when we discover more things that are weird. But true. We'll see you later.