• Question: What was the worst space related injury you have ever dealt with?:)

    Asked by Oliver and Isla to rochellevelho, Lucy, Hannah on 10 Mar 2017.
    • Photo: Lucy Kissick

      Lucy Kissick answered on 10 Mar 2017:


      I’ve never dealt with space-related injuries myself, but I’ve heard horror stories about what astronauts’ bodies go through when things go wrong. When astronauts re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere, they feel very strong G-forces. The strength of gravity is 1 G, and during re-entry astronauts can routinely experience around five Gs (imagine feeling gravity but five times stronger). One time a re-entry went off course and the astronauts experienced up to eight times the normal weight of gravity (8 Gs). All the astronauts survived, but they really struggled to breathe and had a few broken bones.

    • Photo: Hannah Sargeant

      Hannah Sargeant answered on 12 Mar 2017:


      Personally, I have to deal with a lot of liquid nitrogen to cool my experiment down to the temperature of the Moon. Thankfully I have been very careful but liquid nitrogen is very dangerous! I have heard stories about people ‘burning’ themselves which can give you instant frostbite! Also, when liquid nitrogen evaporates it fills the air with nitrogen. This is dangerous in small rooms because it means there is less oxygen to breathe and people have suffocated!

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