 | | Commander
Yuri Malenchenko and ISS Science Officer Ed Lu relax on the
space station. |
No. 11
From:
Alex Kenett, Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia, Age: 6
Question:
Do your ears get blocked when you go into space like mine do when
I go on a plane?
Lu:
Well, it turns out that we try to keep the pressure here fairly
constant. Now when you are in an airplane, the air pressure does
change a little bit. And that's why you feel that feeling in your
ears. It's the same feeling you get if you go dive in the water
and go drop down to the bottom of the pool. You will feel that in
your ears also.
We do occasionally
feel it up here, but it is in times that we are changing the pressure
inside here. For instance, when you are getting into a spacesuit
and when you pressurize the suit you do feel that. Or if you are
depressurizing an airlock, for instance, when you are getting ready
to do a spacewalk. But ordinarily you don't feel this too much.
In fact, it's a great way for you to tell if there has been a change
in pressure. For instance, if there is a depressurization some place,
the first way you will know about it probably is not the alarm system
which we have here, which is quite sensitive, but actually you will
probably feel it in your ears about the same time or even sooner.
No. 12
From:
Emms Smallman, Cannock, Staffordshire, England, Age: 14
Question:
Can you guys actually see the Great Wall of China from space and
if so, what else can you see?
Lu:
It turns out you can see an awful lot from space. You can see the
Great Wall. I've been trying, thus far unsuccessfully, to take a
nice picture of it. The reason being that I haven't been successful
is that the weather hasn't cooperated. There has been a lot of clouds
and haze over that area since I've been trying. But I hope to be
successful before I come back down.
You can see,
for instance, cities quite easily. Islands, of course, are very
easy to spot, and on islands, of course, it is usually easy to spot
the main cities there.
If you look
carefully you can actually see manmade structures. For instance,
you can see the pyramids from space, especially with a pair of binoculars.
They are a little difficult to pick out with just your eyes. With
binoculars you can see an awful lot of things. You can see roads.
You can see harbors. You can even see ships; very large tankers
on the ocean we can see using the binoculars. You can see airplane
contrails, and occasionally at the end of an airplane contrail,
you will see a glint of sunlight off the airplane.
No. 13
From:
C. "Max" LeMire, Central Square, N.Y., Age: 47
Question:
My question deals with past Progress resupply flights. It seems
that in past missions the Progress vehicle was jettisoned prior
to the new arrival. Was this done on this mission and if not, why?
I do not see any reference to it happening.
Lu:
The answer is that we did not jettison it. In fact, we have two
onboard right now. And the reason that we have two onboard is a
little interesting right now. We are going to do a new … We are
going to do a test later where we are going to try to control the
orientation of the Space Station using thrusters on both of the
Progresses at once. Each of the Progresses brings up some fuel,
and we use that fuel to help control the Space Station's orientation.
It turns out that if you are trying to control the orientation of
the Space Station in what's known as roll -- which is, if you are
in an airplane, is like rocking the wings back and forth. When you
are trying to control it in that direction, it is not very effective
because you do not have a very big lever arm if you are using the
Progress that is at the very end of the Service Module, and that
is because it is lined up along that axis, and it does not have
a big moment arm. So we are going to use the Progress that is now
docked to the Docking Module for what is called roll control, and
we hope to save a lot of fuel this way.
No. 14
From:
Emma and Kendall, Auckland, New Zealand, Age: 12
Question:
What is the best part about your job as an astronaut?
Lu:
Well, there is an awful lot of good parts to it. But I think one
of the best parts of it is just being in space and getting a chance
to do all of the different things that we get to do. It is kind
of hard to choose amongst all of the great things that you get to
do, but you do get to see some pretty amazing things and for that
I am thankful.
No. 15
From:
Suzanne Fitzgerald, Seal Beach, Calif., Age: 36
Question:
Can you guys see large storms out there from the space station?
And do you report it to the weather stations in the areas that it
affects?
Lu:
Yes indeed, you sure can. You can see, for instance, there is --
I can tell -- a large storm off of, kind of covering Japan right
now.
It turns out
that we have plenty of weather satellites that are watching these
same areas so there is pretty much continuous coverage of the weather
from the weather satellites, that in fact, is better than we can
see with our eyes here because those cameras onboard those satellites
are specially designed for looking for weather patterns. But it
is quite interesting to look at storms. When you see a large cyclone,
you can see the spiral structure, and you can actually see -- if
there is a hurricane -- you actually see the eye of the hurricane.
You can look right down into it if you are lucky enough to go right
over the top.
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