"We Could Definitely Send A Drone To A Black Hole, Collect Data, Send It Back, And Study It.  But Once

So floating is really interesting.  You're actually very unstable when you float for the first time because your body's rotating on all these different axes, and anything you touch anything, you're inputting motion into that system.  So one of the things we learn the first week or so we get on board is how to stabilize ourselves.  

So we actually hook our feet underneath some hand rails and kind of use our toes [wiggles fingers] to keep ourselves steady.  Then--only then--when we've mastered that, we start to learn how to float in a given direction.  We learn how to push off and get to where we want to go.  It's not always perfect at first, there's a lot of times when you bump your forehead into the hatches or you slam into the wall and knock the computer off.  That's like every first time astronaut experience. But after a little while, you get pretty good at getting around the space station.  

It's a whole 'nother concept when you come back to Earth and you have to remember how to walk again.  So again, there you're kind of unsteady the first few days you're figuring out--your feet haven't touched the ground in a long time, so you have to figure out how to walk. And then you move on to how to jump, and then finally you get good enough and you can learn how to run again.

What does it feel like to float?? Do you have trouble adjusting to walking on the earth after that ??

Joy is great motivator to do things to do.  And that's actually some advice that I have is whatever you're doing in life, make sure that it brings you some joy.  But there's a lot of reasons that people do things, and I think one of the really great things about being an astronaut is getting a chance to explore.  

We get to do things that are absolutely amazing.  And when we see the planet, we explore outer space, and we get to do all these things and we can come back and we can tell people about it.  So I think it's the thrill of science.  I think it's the lure of discovery.  And then the opportunity to share that with the world is really amazing.

Other than joy, why do you do the things you do?

Yeah!  So if you want to be an astronaut, my best piece of advice is definitely to study something in the science field.  Basically every astronaut has some kind of background in science, technology, engineering.  Everybody has--even the fighter pilots have studied something and done a Masters degree in some kind of STEM field.  So if you start there, you're definitely headed in the right direction.

What is your advice to someone who wants to follow the same steps you take?

"So, one of the really cool things about black holes that I've been working on recently is using black holes to study another aspect of astrophysics which we don't really understand called dark matter.  Dark matter pervades the entire universe. It's probably five, six times more populous than regular matter, and yet we still have no idea what this stuff is.

The only thing we know about dark matter is that it reacts to gravity.  And if you really want to push gravity to the extreme, of course the way to do it is with a black hole.  So we're trying to understand how dark matter and black holes interact together."

What is the most fascinating thing about black hole research for you, personally?

"Time works like a lot of things in Einstein's Theory of Relativity: it's relative.  The way that time works according to, say, a person in a spaceship flying into a black would look pretty normal. An astronaut could look at his watch and it would be going more or less normally.  

But the time connected to the outside world, outside of the black hole, would just break down entirely.  It's essentially forming a wall between inside of the black hole and outside of the black hole. And the time on the two sides of that event horizon are just going to be completely different."

How does time work in a black hole?

Ah, that's a really good question!  I think I would say, study as much as you did, but also try to have a little bit of fun.

Hey, Kate! What would you say/what advice would you give to your younger self? ✨

I think it's actually just an incredible thing that we have picked a line-up of space-walkers--we've taken the most qualified people--and we happen to have enough female astronauts that we have two women doing a spacewalk now.  I think it really is a testament to NASA's inclusivity in their selection process.  

The last several classes we've seen a lot more women applying in these classes and also being selected.  And so I think everybody can look at that and say, "You know, that could be me someday!"

As an astronaut who has been on a spacewalk before, what does the all-woman spacewalk mean to you?

I thought, um, I actually thought The Martian was pretty good.  They do a good job there of kind of showing the challenges of working in a space environment: some of the isolation, how do you troubleshoot problems, the kind of interactions that crews would have.  I think that's a movie that captures somewhat the feel of space exploration.

What popular film is the closest to reality for you?

Human space flight is very stressful, and particularly as a flight director with the responsibility for the safety of the crew and the integrity of the vehicle and the execution of the mission, I was very stressed during those years.

One of the things I love to do to de-stress is to run.  So during the Expedition 14 mission, which was seven months long, I was very stressed.  And I figured, hey, why not train for a marathon?  So after training for several months, I actually ran a marathon.  

And this is a picture of me [shows laptop screen] talking to the commander of the International Space Station, Mike E.L.A.  He called my friend while I was at mile 23.  Mile 23!  I'm supposed to be focused!  But she hands me the phone and he says, "Hey, I've had people posting at all the different mile markers and you are looking great out there, so..."

And I said, "Well, can I-can you call me back in like--mmm--thirty minutes because I might be across the finish line by then, and right now I'm kind of busy." ________________

Transciber note: She pronounces name of the commander of the ISS as “Mike Elay”, but a quick google shows that Michael E. Lopez-Alegria was the commander of Expedition 14.  In case you were wondering about the three initials.

What do you do to relax in stressing situations?

Other than flying in combat in my military days, I would say my time at NASA when I've been exploring--probably the scariest time that I had was taking off in the ER-2 behind me on the island of Oahu off a cliff into the ocean of Kaneohe Bay.  

And the reason for that is it climbs up so steep on initial take-off that at night you just go into pitch black, and all you can see is dark sky and dark water, so you can't tell what's what.  And that gets a little unnerving for about the first minute or two of the flight until you know your way up and away from the water.  Otherwise it's a little disorienting and you could be diving into the water.

Have you ever been scared while flying? What was the event that scared you the most?What's your favorite plane to fly?