Video shows how astronaut walked on Earth after six months in space
Hence, moving around is a difficult task as compared to when they had left.
(Web Desk) – NASA astronaut Drew Feustel spent 197 days on the International Space Station (ISS). That is called a standard mission length, and all that time he spent was in microgravity.
Humans aren’t built for weightlessly floating around. When the bodies aren’t constantly straining against the pull of gravity, all sorts of strange things happen. Among those, muscles atrophy, and we lose bone density at about 10 times the rate of osteoporosis.
Moreover, when astronauts return back to Earth, the gravity can induce some severe vertigo as their sense of balance readjusts.
Hence, moving around is a difficult task as compared to when they had left.
Feustel’s video, posted to Twitter in December last year, shows how he stumbles trying to walk just a few steps in a heel-toe straight line.
Welcome home #SoyuzMS09 ! On October 5th this is what I looked like walking heel-toe eyes closed after 197 days on @Space_Station during the Field Test experiment...I hope the newly returned crew feels a lot better. Video credit @IndiraFeustel pic.twitter.com/KsFuJgoYXh
— A.J. (Drew) Feustel (@Astro_Feustel) December 20, 2018
The ISS is currently equipped with a number of machines to give astronauts a full-body workout. On average, they spend two hours a day using them.
This regimen is designed to try and mitigate the atrophy somewhat, but even with the exercise program in place, it takes at least three to four years for an astronaut to fully recover after a six-month stint.
This is just one of the many challenges that are needed to be figured out for the inevitable trip to Mars. The longer the stay, the greater the bone density loss and the trip to Mars will take at least six months each way.
From March 2015 to March 2016, astronauts Scott Kelly of NASA and Mikhail Korniyenko of Roscosmos spent 342 days in space to conduct observations on the health effects of a long space mission.
Kelly, as you might guess, was pretty unsteady on his feet too.
