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At Work in Outer Space

What’s it like to work more than 250 miles above Earth?

October 14, 2024
By Brian Fitzgerald

As You Read, Think About: What do you think would be the hardest part of living in space?

NASA

The diagram above shows this part of the ISS.

SpaceX/NASA; Shutterstock.com (background)

Jeanette Epps

Many people take a car, train, or bus to work. To get to her job, astronaut Jeanette Epps blasted off in a rocket just before 11:00 p.m. on March 3. 

“It was like one of the most amazing rides at an amusement park,” she explains.

About 28 hours later, Epps and three other crew members arrived at the International Space Station (ISS). The giant space laboratory would be their “office” for the next six months.

Epps says one of the big challenges on the ISS is dealing with microgravity. The pull of gravity is much weaker than on Earth, so anything that’s not screwed in or strapped down floats away. 

“You’ll work on something and turn around and it’s gone,” she says. 

Keep reading to find out more about this out-of-this-world workplace.


Note: All quotes are from interviews with students and reporters conducted in May 2024, via NASA Video

Time to Work

NASA

Astronauts on the ISS spend a lot of time conducting experiments that can’t be done on Earth—including many on themselves! The goal is to better understand the effects of living in microgravity. 

Epps regularly drew blood to see how her body’s immune system changed during her time in space. This type of research could help future astronauts stay healthy on much longer missions, to the moon or possibly Mars.

Sleep Tight

NASA

There is no night and day on the ISS. It orbits Earth so fast that the crew sees the sun rise 16 times every 24 hours. 

At bedtime, astronauts zip themselves into sleeping bags strapped to a wall so they won’t float around as they sleep. 

“It’s odd to not really have an up or down, so you wake up kind of just disoriented almost every day,” Epps says.

Taking a Walk

NASA

Sometimes astronauts go outside the ISS to work in space. During spacewalks, they usually spend about six hours installing equipment or making repairs. They wear spacesuits that provide oxygen, water, and protection from the sun’s harmful rays.

Staying Fit

Roscosmos/NASA

Living in space can do strange things to the body, like weakening bones and muscles. To stay in shape, crew members exercise for about two hours a day. But that has some unique challenges. For example, astronauts wear a harness while running on a treadmill so they don’t float away.

1. Why do astronauts on the International Space Station often do experiments on themselves? How might their findings help people in the future?

2. Summarize what happens during a spacewalk.

3. In what ways might working on the space station be considered an “extreme job”?

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