Departing Space Station Commander Provides Tour of Orbital Laboratory

Sorry, no conspiracy theory or anything but a great video nevertheless. A full guided tour of the I.S.S. and the facilities onboard, some great views included and overall great watch

i love these videos.absolutely amazing

reply to post by Zcustosmorum


Great video. I would love to go up there for a weekend , but six months of bad hair days... Not so much.

Thanks for the eye opener tour. I don't know much about the space station, so it was informative and interesting. Endless stuff, tubes, plastic, small spaces,corridors and stations. The stuff of claustrophobic nightmares for some people and adventure for others. I wonder what the whole thing looks like from the outside at the moment?

I can imagine her loose hair falling all over the place, and that leads me to wonder what kind of filtration system is in there for things like loose hair?

And does anyone know about the temperature in the space station? Does it get cold inside when it is in the dark?

Originally posted by aboutface
And does anyone know about the temperature in the space station? Does it get cold inside when it is in the dark?

I would imagine if it weren't for the air conditioning/heating system that when the ISS was on the day side of the Earth, it would get incredibly hot, and when it's on the night side, it would get incredibly cold.

Originally posted by aboutface
Thanks for the eye opener tour. I don't know much about the space station, so it was informative and interesting. Endless stuff, tubes, plastic, small spaces,corridors and stations. The stuff of claustrophobic nightmares for some people and adventure for others. I wonder what the whole thing looks like from the outside at the moment?

Like this: upload.wikimedia.org...

I can imagine her loose hair falling all over the place, and that leads me to wonder what kind of filtration system is in there for things like loose hair?

Because convection is a gravity based phenomena, they have to have constant ventilation in order to mix the atmosphere correctly. Stray hairs and basically everything else onboard eventually gets sucked against filters. That's where stuff gets captured. It's pretty regular stuff.

And does anyone know about the temperature in the space station? Does it get cold inside when it is in the dark?

The temperature is pretty well regulated, but you can see the live info if you'd like! spacestationlive.jsc.nasa.gov...

Great video, very informative! It's the first time I've seen where the people on the American side sleep. I think the American segment is pretty spacious and well-lit. The Russian segment is slightly darker and more claustrophobic.

reply to post by wildespace


The Russian side was a lot more noisy.

I guess that you would get used to it but the constant humming.would take me a while to get used to.

It is definitely not for me. I am too big of a dude to be in that tight of an environment.

I need a 2x large space station.....

Good video, but way too claustrophobic for me. One thing I notice is that they can not look out to see the Sun or Moon or stars. I've been told the only portholes with a view of deep space are always covered up, as the glass is thin and delicate and may get hit by micrometeorites. That sounds bogus to me, and I'd say a spaceward looking porthole made of some of the super tough glass I'm sure NASA has would be stronger and more resilient than the hull itself. Maybe the ISS was never intended for astronomy, but jeez, just a peek of the heavens doesn't seem like too much to ask.

Originally posted by GaryN
Good video, but way too claustrophobic for me. One thing I notice is that they can not look out to see the Sun or Moon or stars. I've been told the only portholes with a view of deep space are always covered up, as the glass is thin and delicate and may get hit by micrometeorites. That sounds bogus to me, and I'd say a spaceward looking porthole made of some of the super tough glass I'm sure NASA has would be stronger and more resilient than the hull itself. Maybe the ISS was never intended for astronomy, but jeez, just a peek of the heavens doesn't seem like too much to ask.

edit on 9-12-2012 by GaryN because: spelling correction

edit on 9-12-2012 by GaryN because: (no reason given)

Did you even watch the video? One of the very first places she visits is the Cupola. This is a complete 180 viewing area on the Earth side. There's no way they can't see the Sun, or stars or the Moon. Random example: scienceblogs.com...

reply to post by exponent


The big bay window overlooking the Earth is great, but why no 'back window' looking out into deep space? And a little telescope to use in off-duty times maybe? I know some of the crew have been astronomers, I'd sure they'd like to take a peek.

reply to post by GaryN

They have done some astrophotography from the ISS.


science.nasa.gov...

"Pettit recently took some lovely pictures of star fields in the southern hemisphere: the Large Magellanic Cloud (a nearby galaxy that orbits our own Milky Way galaxy), the Coal Sack Nebula (an inky-black interstellar cloud), and the Southern Cross.

"These pictures show how wonderfully stable the space station is," says Pettit. "When the camera is mounted to the window, the ISS itself serves as a tripod. Any movement would cause streaks in the star images." But the station's Control Moment Gyros maintain attitude with rock-solid precision. "I don't believe that the ISS was designed for astronomy," adds Pettit, "but it functions very well as a platform for astrophotography."

One of the curious things about sky watching from orbit is the appearance of stars. "They don't twinkle," says Pettit. Twinkling is caused by irregularities in Earth's atmosphere that refract starlight to and fro. But in orbit there is no atmosphere. Stars are remarkably steady and piercing."

Astronauts on the ISS took photos of the transit of Venus: eol.jsc.nasa.gov...
One set of those images was taken through a neutral color solar filter.