With out gravity, the New 12 months’s ‘ball drop’ seemed a little bit completely different for astronauts in house.
Astronauts aboard the Worldwide House Station launched a festive New 12 months’s video, full with a zero-gravity “ball drop.”
5 of the seven astronauts at the moment on the station as a part of Expedition 64– Kate Rubins, Shannon Walker, Victor Glover, Soichi Noguchi, and Michael Hopkins— appeared within the video which was posted on the station’s social media pages on Wednesday.
The group wished viewers a contented new 12 months and launched a blow-up mannequin of Earth, which floated to the ceiling.
“Some of the well-known New 12 months’s Eve traditions is watching the ball drop in Instances Sq. in New York Metropolis,” mentioned Glover, the primary Black astronaut to remain on the house station for an prolonged time period.
“As many people have fun the brand new 12 months from residence this 12 months, we introduced this well-known custom to house to share with you,” Hopkins mentioned.
The video has been considered greater than 72,000 occasions on Twitter.
The crew is conducting scientific experiments throughout their time on the house station. Their areas of analysis embody “research of how crops develop in microgravity, tissue regeneration, time notion, modifications in coronary heart tissue gene expression, and a attainable technique for eradicating particles from house,” according to NASA.
Hopkins, Glover, Walker and Noguchi are a part of the SpaceX Crew Dragon which arrived on the ISS in November. Ryzhikov and Kud-Sverchkov are a part of the Russian house company Roscosmos and Rubins is from NASA.
November marked 20 years of steady astronaut presence on the ISS. The station has hosted 240 astronauts from 19 completely different nations since its creation.
