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Space Station Crew Forced to Cut Calories
gollum123 writes "CNN and others are reporting that food is running so low aboard the international space station that both the crew members have been asked to cut their calories, at least until a Russian supply ship arrives in a little over two weeks. The situation is so bad that if a Russian cargo vessel scheduled to arrive on Dec. 25 has a mishap or is significantly delayed, the astronauts, one American and one Russian, will have to abandon the station and return home months ahead of schedule. An independent team is looking into how the food inventory ended up being tracked so poorly and how it can be improved in the future."
.. where are they when you need them?
"a Russian cargo vessel scheduled to arrive on Dec. 25". So they won't me missing out on the brussel sprouts this year. Poor sods :)
Philip
Signatures are broken
You could also lose that weight by stopping the caffeinated drinks and getting some excercise. As a side benefit, you might get some sunlight as well.
Wh47 d1d j00 541, 31337 15n't t3h r0xor5 ne m0r3???
Is the team usually this small or have most of them buggered off for Christmas?
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posting anonymously due to grossness.
Before people start mocking Russians, and their food situation, just let me say that I ate more of, and better quality food when I was in Russia than I usually do in the UK. Salo though, is horrible stuff.
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Hell, with the savings made they could probably upgrade the menus a bit, instead of eating paste three times a day they could afford to buy the astronauts some hot grits or something equally tasty once in a while.
Making the moon less necessary since 1998.
I like my toys as much, no possibly MORE then the next guy. And God knows aviation is my thing.
The Space Station should be a no brainer.
But there comes a time where you have to say, 'Look we gave it the good old college try. If it was meant to be it would be a success already, but alas it isn't working out.'.
For Gods sake deorbit it already.
Could there possibly be a more humiliating end to the space station then being abondend for lack of food?
This could be the final straw for the ISS boondoggle. You can't do astronomy from the station that's even a tenth of the precision of Hubble. Why? All the vibrations from all the environmental gear. In fact, you can't do decent science experiments of any type. Why? Two people can't take time from just holding the place together to do the experiments, and we lack the budget (and now - the food!) to have a big enough crew to make the place something other than a multi-billion-dollar Astronaut Habitrail. Right now, it's no better than Mir was in its final days: astronauts spend all their time trying not to die. '"At present, the primary goal of the ISS is unclear," the NRC study observes.' I think it's dangerously close to changing from an investment to a sunk cost.
"Wow. Now THAT'S a lot of angry Indians." - Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer
...where finishing ahead of schedule is a bad thing!
Maybe the astronauts jus ate too much all year so that they can be back home for Christmas turkey.
Million dollar sig.
The problem with living in microgravity is that the lack of acceleration results in the decalcification of bones and the atrophy of muscle tissue. Some exercise (like the much-mocked Soloflex) can help stave off this atrophy, but the real key to the whole solution is to keep calcium and protein levels in the body high.
Restricting food intake will result in some very serious physical damage to the astronauts. If you've ever seen footage of astronauts who have just returned to Earth after a long mission, they are hardly able to stand. That is with full nutrition. The poor astronauts up there now will have to deal with much lowered calcium and protein reserves in their blood and will likely suffer from advanced osteoporosis as well as general muscular atrophy.
I'd go ahead and blame Windows programmers for this mistake. But in all seriousness, this is probably a result of the reliance on the cooperation of multiple nations to do the right thing according to the schedule. It's hard enough getting cats into a pen, it's that much harder to get countries known for 'cutting corners' (like Russia) to do their job correctly.
Why not turn it into a new reality TV show, a la Survivor? This could easily provide a smidgen of the funding to keep the space station going. And instead of voting people off the space station, the person who loses a challenge gets eaten, so the food situation practically solves itself.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
Hey, they Nasa is such a wonderful organisation. They did : a poem (http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/artgallery/soto_po em.html/), some photo shoots with aerosmith (http://http//www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery /index.html) and so much more.
What can you say, i guess now is the time for serious issues, like food on space stations, lol.
Those who wonder at those who do wonder, while those who do, well, do. Unless, i do wonder?
This hurts me because in a few decades, when the majority of our manufacturing base has been outsourced, we'll have to depend on outside help for the very basics of our way of life. This is already happening if one considers the flu vaccine.
The Russians, though poor, seem to make better technical decisions. I remember a slashdotter mentioning here sometime ago that Russian helicopters can be fixed with the simplest of everyday materials and still deliver (read reliably fly)! Contrast that with American ones that require hours of maintenance for a few hours of flight. The Sea Kings (of Canada) require 30 hours of maintenance for every hour of flight, and they are unavailable for operations 40 per cent of the time. http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/cdnmilitary/seak ing.html.
Imagine...........!
"...the astronauts, one American and one Russian..." That's just ONE astronaut right?
- "They misunderestimated me."
Q: Why do they only drink Sprite at NASA?
A: Because they can't get 7-Up!
And the Challenger didn't go up, it went down. Fuck dude...get it straight. The Iraqi Information Minister's second cousin was more funny than you.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
You could also have lots of sex... oh wait..
stuff
I know April is still quite far off, but just look at it:
``NASA and the Russian Space Agency were stunned to learn last week that the astronauts had begun digging into the 45-day food reserve -- which exists to protect against a delayed supply shipment -- in mid-November.''
Do they seriously mean that:
1. The astronauts weren't supplied with enough food
2. The situation was so bad they had to dig into the reserves
3. They didn't tell Earth about this?
If this is how seriously the people involved take their mission, I say we cut the funding right here, right now.
I've never been able to see space flight as anything but a waste of time, energy and money, but I've been okay with it; other people have lives and opinions too. But time and time again it turns out they don't do it properly. Exploding rockets and space shuttles, confusing metric and imperial units, failed Mars missions, and now this.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Any possibilities of them reconstituting their own poop?
They should never have included those suspicious looking brownies in the last supply run.
_O_
.|< The named which can be named is not the true named
Must ... resist ... comment ... about English food.
I'm proud of myself, but the effort at self-restraint gave me a headache.
I'm sorry if I haven't offended anyone
Their daily intake is 3000 calories, before the cut that is.
Wow! What on earth [sic!] are they doing up there? I'd think they would not require that much food since they don't have to deal with gravity.
Inquiring minds want to know...
Actually, 3000 calories sounds pretty normal for very fit people in somewhat difficult conditions. Remember, the average male(on a global scale, not just the industrialized, lazy parts of the world) requires around 2300 kcal just to get by without the body deteriorating. Taking only myself into comparison, when I'm fully active with my normal training and stuff, I burn around 4000 kcal/day, just to keep up with the energy need, and I can go higher when pushing myself. Worst off are elite cyclists, elite soldiers in the field etc, who can require up to 12000 kcal/day if they want to avoid bodily deterioration.
The previous crew has apparently eaten all the meat and tasties. All is left in abundance now is some confectionery and some juices if I recall correctly what I read yesterday. Now you see - when your mom was telling you to eat it all and not to pick your food she, in fact, was preparing you to be a spaceman one day.
That's like the British astronaut who was visiting the Mir space station and asked the resident Russian cosmonauts what they did for entertainment. "Oh, we have a bottle of vodka," said one of the Russkies. "Would you like a shot?" The Brit took a swig from the bottle. "It tastes a bit weak," he remarked, "I expected real Russian vodka to have a bit more kick!" "Well," said one of the Russians, "It's been through each of us six times already!"
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Hey I know the Iraqi Information Minister's second cousin. I mean, he's my second cousin. And he's fucking hilarious. Get it straight, man. Stop spreading disinformation on the Internet, the one place everyone can find tons of true, undisputed facts. The one place on earth (aside from Iraq of course) I am truly at home.
- Iraqi Information Minster
P.S. Iraq rules, long live Saddam! America will never defeat Iraq! Baghdad will never be taken! Death to the Infidels, and...
Shit, gotta go.
just change the gravitational constant of the universe!
finish your food kiddo... there are hungry astronauts in space.
I don't want to read
What on earth [sic!] are they doing up there?
Exercising like mad. They have to - if they don't they lose muscle mass because of the lack of gravity. The Soviets learned this the hard way. When the cosmonauts who went on the first long-term missions returned to earth, they were practically crippled and had to go through months of rehab.
Lost: Sig, white with black letters. No collar. Reward if found!
Don't we all know by now it's the CARBS that count and not calories?
My best sig is this one.
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Don't they realize if they eat Chinese take out they'll just be hungry in a half hour? It's not rocket science, people!
having extra muscle requires a lot more calories to support than fat (or than nothing) even when it's doing nothing. for most of our evolution food was scare and getting rid of that metabolic cost when it wasn't being used was beneficial and a good thing.
While the Fisher space pen did require a large sum of money to develop, NASA had nothing to do with the development. In fact, NASA also used pencils before the space pen was available.
This is just like the story of one of the very first modal imapact hammers. A modal impact hammer is used for vibration testing. It contains a force transducer in the head of the hammer so you can measure the excitation force applied to the structure you are hitting with it. Anyway, it one of these efforts to trim the fat on government spending (ie. $10,000 toilet seat type stuff), they were attacking the use of a $5,000 hammer. It turned out to be a $5 hammer and a $4,995 force transducer! So try getting the facts straight before you go spouting off so you don't end up with egg on your face like those guys.
Also, the Fisher space pen did not have a pump. It contains an ink that when at rest is too thick to squeeze around the roller ball of the pen. However, when the ball is in motion the shearing force applied to the ink allows the ink to flow and the user to write.
Well, when there is zero gravity, there is no need to maintain muscle to fight gravity.
So if no need to maintain the muscle, muscle mass will decrease.
Is it true that more people vote for the winner of American Idol, than vote for the president? -Ali G.
If the astronauts are upset that NASA screwed up the food supply, they could always rebel and go on a hunger strike.
Uh, wait..That's what NASA wants them to do...
If "disco" means "I learn" in Latin, does "discothèque" mean "I learn technology"?
Steamed with a little butter and salt is best. And if you can't take the big ones, buy the frozen baby brussel sprouts. They have less of the flavor compounds that many (particularly those weaned on baby food and sweets) find distasteful.
This has been another off-topic post.
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
... from many "news" outlets.
It is uniformly described as a "diet" or "cutback".
Will someone please explain to me why no one is willing to use the term "forced rationing"? As that certainly seems to be the most accurate description from the high peak of reason and sensibility where I reside...
Or maybe the "news" is not about presenting "accurate description"s.
Upside: No drug laws in space.
Downside: You still get the munchies.
There are 01 kinds of cars in the world. The General Lee, and everything else.
The Chinese didn't lease the Soyuz design: at one point they tried to purchase a Soyuz for reverse-engineering purposes, but the only thing the Russians were willing to supply for the price was a capsule stripped of almost all its systems.
While obviously Soyuz inspired, the Chinese design is home grown and features a number of design improvements over the Soyuz: it's larger, and most notably, the orbital module is, unlike the Soyuz OM, capable of independant flight.
There's a good article by James Oberg about it in IEEE Spectrum.
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
Wrong. The energy from food is made by breaking chemical bonds - those bonds have potential energy in them. That energy has a mass equal to the energy divided by the speed of light squared - that's very small, but it certainly isn't 0. In a nuclear reaction you have exactly the same thing, but with bonds between nucleons breaking instead - it's just the strong force rather than the EM force. The energy priciples are the same.
I know everyone loves to joke on the former Iraqi Information Minister, but am I the only one that is reminded of Rumsfeld and the rest saying 'there is no organized gorilla resistance in Iraq'?
motherly order a the dining table:
"Now Johnny, finish your vegetables. Don't you know the astronauts on the space station don't have enought to eat?"
"Piter, too, is dead."
No, just change from English to metric. That ought to do it.