Free Floating in Space

This looks like it would be really cool but maybe a little scary at
the same time..
Need to find a way to make it smaller..
I'll just give a link to the image..
Its an image of an Astronaut floating about 100 meters from the station..further than anyone has ever been from the ship.





[edit on 9/15/2007 by Kr0n0s]

"Really cool and a little scary" is certainly the way I'd describe this picture.
Frankly, it's almost impossible to imagine what it must be like to be floating in space, especially so far from the spaceship. 100 meters might not seem far but it must have felt like a million miles to the astronaut who was just hanging in the void of space.

Great picture.

Sorry, I was in a hurry earlier and didnt get a chance to post the descriptions..

Explanation: At about 100 meters from the cargo bay of the space shuttle Challenger, Bruce McCandless II was further out than anyone had ever been before. Guided by a Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), astronaut McCandless, pictured above, was floating free in space. McCandless and fellow NASA astronaut Robert Stewart were the first to experience such an "untethered space walk" during Space Shuttle mission 41-B in 1984. The MMU works by shooting jets of nitrogen and has since been used to help deploy and retrieve satellites. With a mass over 140 kilograms, an MMU is heavy on Earth, but, like everything, is weightless when drifting in orbit. The MMU was replaced with the SAFER backpack propulsion unit.

Source page-APOD

Yea, it is very cool... I dont know if i could even imagine myself doing this lol..
Just think, he is traveling at a very, very high rate of speed (17k mph) or so and he..

[edit on 9/16/2007 by Kr0n0s]

And I feel isolated scuba diving by myself...
Great picture.

I wonder how lonely he feels out there, personally i would be packing bricks if had to do that as part of my job description!

That can't be 100 meters. Probably like 50 meters. If it was 100 meters his silhouette would have been A LOT smaller.

reply to post by ZikhaN

Im not that great at judging distance but it looked like it was more than 100 meters to me as well..
Does anyone know how I can thumbnail or scale down this pic so people just coming here can preview it before viewing the entire image?

I would have to take extra way to make motion...in case something went wrong...back up ....plan B something.....it is the scarious looking pic .....but I woud do it with plan B.........and bring my camera along.....one of a kind pics...

reply to post by mrmajestyk6309


Yea, I wouldn't really feel safe without the physical presence of a tether.
What if this utility ran out of "fuel" or some how malfunctioned.

Originally posted by ZikhaN
That can't be 100 meters. Probably like 50 meters. If it was 100 meters his silhouette would have been A LOT smaller.

It could be the camera is zoomed in on him.

Ok, I was to lazy to do this earlier but I went ahead and resized it and uploaded to photobuck-buck-buckeeeeeet




[edit on 9/16/2007 by Kr0n0s]

Originally posted by ZikhaN
That can't be 100 meters. Probably like 50 meters. If it was 100 meters his silhouette would have been A LOT smaller.

It's possible he was 100 meters away at one time during the EVA, but this photo was taken when he was slightly closer,

OR

This photo was taken with a telephoto lens.

The fact remains that his EVA DID take him 100 meters from the shuttle.