SpaceX signs off on another successful mission with Pacific splashdown SpaceX's Dragon cargo capsule has made a splash-landing in the Pacific Ocean as planned after detaching from the International Space Station. The month-long mission ended with a successful, if damp, landing and the 3,100lb of completed scientific experiments, broken hardware, and dirty clothes has been successfully retrieved …
In times gone past, I'm told, it used to be cheaper to ship dirty laundry from the American West Coast to Hawaii, clean, starch & iron it, and then ship it back than to pay to have someone do it on the mainland.
Now ISS is shipping its dirty clothes home (to Mom, thanks Mom) so they can be washed... and probably not returned. Is a zero-g washing machine the one device that's beyond NASA's ability to design?
Tell the world and inquiring (and strange) minds will leap into action! Let zero-g washing machine designing begin!
The leading conclusions I expect to be drawn from the worm experiment are
a) that there are previously unaccounted effects of microgravity leading to a loss of muscle mass and tone
b) that the body's reaction to microgravity leads to unpredictable changes in metabolism that result in poor uptake of essential minerals
c) further that a certain amount of reduction in physical size may occur
d) that regular exercise along a general line of squeezing, bending and stretching may assist in staving of the effects, and
e) that the most viable long-term solution to the physiological effects of human habitation in space is to fill the entire cabin with high grade loam and require astronauts to burrow through it, thus mitigating the concerns of (a) and (b), negating the effects of (c) and fulfilling the requirements of (d).
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