Those astronauts must be slightly insane.

[thinktoomuchtoooften]

I mean obviously they’re highly intelligent individuals and must know what they’re doing… but the risks are so huge and they have families. To me it’s just madness.

My DF is a scientist who does a lot of work with esa/nasa and whilst he doesn't know this crew, he knew others, including peake, hadfield the columbia crew...

NASA are very much a family, they look after everyone, as attested by the columbia families, so if anything happened to the single dad, his kids would be surrounded by love and support. I had to babysit some of the children for a few hours a few months after Columbia and I'll never forget the day I did so, their trauma was still so real.

not a word of a lie btw

About 10 years ago, at every climate protest you’d see signs that said “there is no Planet B”. That is the literal truth. While I can admire the dedication to scientific discovery, we don’t have a fall back if we make this planet uninhabitable for humans. I read last year a very detailed scientific takedown of Elon Musk’s idea that colonising Mars might be feasible. While there might be Earth comparable planets out there somewhere, there is no science fiction magic travel mechanism that will take humans to the other side of the galaxy.
It makes me sad and angry to realise how many people don’t realise just how precious and irreplaceable what we have is.
The dream of space is enticing but hard-headed thought says the money could be spent on better things right now. Western countries led by the US are causing millions of deaths by cutting vital humanitarian aid, not to mention the consequences of war. Cutting edge medical research is also being defunded by the Trump administration, and climate research is being absolutely decimated because the aim is to deny that climate change exists.

Well, if everyone was of this stance, we'd still be living in caves. Bear in mind, as the Earth is the only known place in the universe to support life, eschewing attempts to get off the planet - in the name of health and safety - leaves us as sitting ducks, at the mercy of any rogue asteroid, for a swift return to amoeba stage for the next few million years. I say good for them.

Just to be clear, I admire the astronauts and NASA. I despise those like Musk who claims that we don’t have to worry if this planet burns up as we can colonise Mars, and who’s cut funding for those in desperate need, killing hundreds of thousands / millions, while splurging on vanity space travel.

@ChangePrivacyQuestion it’s not a rogue asteroid we need to worry about, it’s accelerating climate breakdown and nuclear weapons in an unstable world. We’re not going to find a planet similar enough to Earth to be habitable that’s close enough for a small handful of human refugees to get to. That’s science fiction stuff.
Personally I’m also concerned about the amazingly complex beautiful ecosystems on Earth with millions of species and feel like we should dedicate efforts to saving them and ourselves. Here on Earth. And with absolute clarity that there is no alternative. We’ve already pretty much doomed coral reefs to extinction by making the oceans too warm for them.

Despite what I think of their paymasters/investors I think there is something to be admired in the Astronauts themselves. Going somewhere no one has ever been before.

Has anyone seem the tiny tiny capsule they will be spending 10 days in ? Fuck me I couldn’t even get in it.

And the space toilet in the middle ? Taking a shit right in front of your colleagues ? Nice.

And I know it’s so trivial but the female astronaut and her hair - god it will be disgusting by the time she gets back. Mine would be.

Still I am all for scientific progression. Assume they will gain something from using a manned mission rather than a probe.

They're not defecating in front of colleagues.
Koch's hair will be in a helmet, I can't think how it would get very dirty.

They don’t wear their helmets all the time!

Astronauts can wash their hair on the ISS, using special no rinse shampoo, but I’m not sure whether they would on a short mission like this one.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uIjNfZbUYu8

The toilet in the image on the BBC looked like was in the middle of the capsule ? Must be below the floor ? That’s a lot better - considering the lack of space.
Still wouldn’t be for me.

Helmets are worn for at least part of the time. Whatever the ins and outs, I would suggest that washing her hair isn't Koch's priority. I could be wrong.

Yes, there is a privacy door. I suppose you just have to make the best of it, hurtling through space as they are!

I think it’s stupid. We do not need to do this. We have fucked yo this planet so much, we don’t need a base on the moon or to explore mars. It’s absolute human arrogance to do this.

Humans have ruined this planet through sheer greed. It disgusts me that some of them arrogantly assume the right to expand beyond Earth so the same can be done more widely.

Space exploration has led to profound scientific discoveries and technological advancements, including the confirmation of black holes, detection of thousands of exoplanets, and the mapping of cosmic expansion. It has yielded essential technologies like satellite communication, weather forecasting, CMOS sensors for smartphones, memory foam, and advancements in medical imaging (MRI/CT scans

Agree but space programmes usually boost progress in general because they deliver genuine innovation across the board. For instance, rekindling the space programme is a boost for research into fusion and other propulsion methods. It's not true that it's at odds with saving the planet. Exoplanet research for instance is a great way to understand gases and how climates work. All that is extremely helpful to us on Earth.

@StandFirm I'm fine with making the case for pure scientific research with possible side benefits. What drives me mad is people pretending that it's important because there might be a future where humanity has wrecked earth and yet somehow retains the capability to travel to another planet where life is viable and start from scratch - not appreciating that what we have here on earth is irreplaceable.
And I think that space travel shouldn't get an automatic special pass for vast spending when other science is being cut to the bone. Not that it's NASA's fault that their colleagues around the US are being made redundant, obviously!

That doesn't make it actively happy.

Bad: waste of money, pointless exercise, we should focus our money and efforts on making life on earth better.

Humanity’s survival, evolution and ascendance to top species would all indicate we are, in fact, extremely good at fixing things. If we weren’t we would be extinct by now.

Humans haven’t ruined the planet. The planet is just fine. The planet was here long before us and will be here long after us. The human species are but a blip on the history line of Planet Earth. It is your own human arrogance and inflated sense of self-importance that prescribes us as having “ruined” the planet.

3 Million litres of fuel alone to launch it, which has a certain irony in current circumstances!

How?

YANBU. Nothing on earth would persuade me to do their job. Look what happened to the Challenger space shuttle back in 1986.

I'm sure I'm not going to change your mind but for info Challenger had no crew escape system (long story behind the reasons for that).

Orion/SLS has a Launch Abort System that in theory at least would give the crew a decent chance of escape in the event of a similar mishap.

www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2025/how-orion-s-launch-abort-system-protects-astronauts.html

It has also lead to 9000 metric tonnes of garbage in the earths orbit and god knows what else. We ca be thankful for the byproducts but that doesn’t mean we have to support further jaunts to the moon and beyond. We can learn to say no.