Free falling from the sky

Being an editor in these hectic days when analysts and journalists so much love „internet-kills-the-press” talk isn’t easy. Have you ever thought people in other industries may feel worse than you?

If you have not, please take a look at this short interview published in August issue of „Wired” magazine.

Adam Rogers talks to the NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson who took a ride home from the International Space Station.

Her Soyuz descent module failed to separate properly, forcing it into a ballistic path - a fast, steep entry that caused the craft to miss the landing site by 295 miles.

What was it like?

Wired: Were you scared?

Whitson: No. I was too busy to be scared. I knew what was happening was not strictly nominal, but we train for these scenarios.

Wired: Uh-huh. You astronauts always say that.

Whitson: Sorry. I guess it’s a cliche, but it’s true. Of course, there’s not much you can do in 8 gs. But that was probably a minute or less, and then it dropped to 4.5 gs and we could breathe again. Then we felt the big yank of the parachute deploying.
Wired: Again, scary.

Whitson: Oh, we also had smoke coming from under the control panel, so we shut it off. That meant we had no altitude data aside from a less reliable wrist gauge and looking out the window.

Wired: And the actual touchdown?

Whitson: We bounced about 10 meters and rolled. When we stopped, I was on top, hanging in my seat.

Wired: Which is when you got out of the capsule?

Whitson: Well, when Yuri opened the hatch there was a grass fire outside, so we recommended he close the hatch for a little bit. It was desert grass, so it burned out relatively quickly. And then we managed to crawl out.

Wired: Any landing you can crawl away from is a good one, I guess.

Whitson: Obviously it wasn’t totally nominal.

Are you too busy to be scared, either?

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