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Hi there!
Spacecritters visiting the ISS? Why don't you take a peek and convince yourselves.
As soon as the astronaut has disappeared the show starts.
The first flying critter appears 00:45 seconds into the video (on top of the instrument panel), the second one shows up at 01:39 (center right), the third critter we see in the upper right corner at 03:50 and the fourth one at 04:00 in the lower right corner. You should also check for some slight movements at 03:16 left on top of the instrument-panel. This looks like a couple crawling critters. (Or is it a reflection of light?)
In order to exclude or eliminate NASA's biological experiments aboard the ISS, I checked whether NASA (recently) had been performing any experiments involving butterflies or bugs. There have not been such experiments!
So what is it we see? As some people claim: small pieces of paper flying around, lifted and transported through the air by the airflow coming from the ventilation system. Really? These "things" come from several directions and they do not look like pieces of paper to me. What about dust? The funny thing is that this is the only scene that shows these objects and I have taped all shuttle missions and watched hundreds of hours of NASA live streams but never saw them again. So if this was dust, why have I never seen anything like this again?
Looking at the way they move, you could compare it with how single cell organisms swim inside a fluid. Are we seeing something we were not supposed to?
Originally posted by skyblueworld
reply to post by EA006
If a human needs to use their hands and feet in space to move around due to no gravity, how are the insects moving around so quickly and freely?
Wings. There's air on board.
i see your point. The insects would...they would...get inside the equipment...and ...die. They would die and be icky. Is that what your point is?
Originally posted by skyblueworld
So we have insects flying around the ISS where millions of pounds worth of instruments are?
The Insect Habitat
The Insect Habitat (IH) was designed to support a variety of insect species. However, during the initial flight increments, it will be dedicated to experiments using Drosophila melanogaster, or fruit flies.
The Insect Habitat will enable studies of the fruit fly to learn how microgravity affects development, nervous system function, movement and behavior, growth, reproduction, aging, gene expression, mutagenesis from radiation and circadian rhythms or sleep/wake cycles.