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hi my name is Jeanette Epps hi I'm NASA

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astronaut Kayla Barron I am NASA

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astronaut Charlie Lundgren I just got

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back from the International Space

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Station a few weeks ago it's awesome to

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be back with my family and friends to be

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back here on the earth I do love to get

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real letters whether it's at home or at

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work or even in space we get cards and

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letters delivered from family from time

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to time which is so exciting and this

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year we'd like to thank all the students

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who sent in letters and notes to us and

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this is one of my favorite things to do

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is to read your letters so let's get to

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it

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[Music]

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the first time you went into space how

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did it feel were you scared or happy my

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first base launch was incredible we were

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super well prepared so I think for the

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most part we were just executing the

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procedures doing the job we had

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practiced doing but as we counted down

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you know the famous countdown from 10 9

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8 up to that moment of launch the rocket

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engines light underneath us and there's

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kind of This Magic Moment where you hang

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in the air you're just off the launch

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pad and you can feel that you're

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starting to travel to space but you

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haven't really started accelerating yet

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and in that moment I was just flooded

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with pure joy I was just so excited that

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my journey was finally starting and so

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excited to do it with my teammates my

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crew and our team around the world and

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so yeah it was I was happy more than

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anything else

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put that on my refrigerator oh look at

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this this makes my day how great is that

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that's going up on the wall for sure

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I love those colors love it

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I had a bowl of cereal and milk for

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breakfast I had chili for lunch and

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every now and then you open these up and

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you learn what like somebody's favorite

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food is is there cheese to eat in your

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spaceship I love cheese oh my gosh me

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too actually it's really hard to send

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cheese to space because it goes bad

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pretty quickly but you can send some

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hard cheeses to space so I really hope

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that that's there in my spaceship Sarah

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says I think space is very cool but I

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think space ice cream would be the best

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part Sarah you know all that there is to

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know because you're absolutely right

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space ice cream is very cool and cold do

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you like chicken nuggets I love all

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chicken nuggets I'm sure there's

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somebody out there that does not like

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chicken nuggets but that is not me so I

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think the bigger chicken nugget question

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is how do you eat your chicken nuggets

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with a fork and knife dip them in

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ketchup are you kind of a mayonnaise or

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a mustard person or is it just straight

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up I've got 18 chicken nuggets in front

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of me and I'm getting after it all right

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now so I don't care how you eat yours

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but I'll tell you how I eat mine I

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definitely like chicken nuggets I like a

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little bit of ketchup and I definitely

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use my fingers it's a great question and

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I hope you have a uh a wonderful holiday

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season Charlie so what type of rocket

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ship did you go on well this most recent

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Mission I flew in a crew Dragon capsule

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on top of a Falcon 9 rocket it was

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absolutely amazing we launched from

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Kennedy Space Center and we were in low

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earth orbit in less than nine minutes

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now my first mission about seven years

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ago I launched in a soyuz capsule on a

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soyuz rocket out of baikonur cosmodrome

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and Kazakhstan I launched with our

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Russian partners and and that was my

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first flight and so it was really cool

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to have that experience of flying into

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space on two different types of rockets

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what's your favorite thing about your

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job well Piper one of my favorite things

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about my job is that I continue to learn

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new things just about every day flying

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in the t-38 doing robotics just about

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everything that we do here there's

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always something new going on and I like

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to learn this is cool this is a launch

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pad look at that

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very detailed from Gabe Gabe that's

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awesome I see we got the we got the pad

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here we got the Gantry that we walk

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across into the capsule there with the

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astronauts inside that is a great

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drawing Gabe good job can you feel heat

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in the spaceship especially when we're

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coming home that our spacecraft gets

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really hot that's why we have a heat

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shield that protects us as our

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spacecraft starts to travel through the

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atmosphere because all of that

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resistance of the gases in the

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atmosphere really cause the the craft to

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heat up but we're in suits that give us

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cooling so they keep our bodies cool and

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it's kind of like you have air

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conditioning so even though the vehicle

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gets really hot the spaceship gets

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really hot we stay at a comfortable

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temperature what types of things do we

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do in outer space right now we're in low

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earth orbit so that's where the space

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station is we do two main things there

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one is to keep it functioning and keep

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it working because it's a complex

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machine there in low earth orbit the

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other thing we do is we do research

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there and a lot of our time is trying to

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understand the human body body

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understand different things that we need

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to take the next step to the Moon to

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stay and after that to Mars and so to

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keep exploring we have to keep learning

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I love not knowing what is inside each

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of these letters hey this one from Evan

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is really cool the drawings are always

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my favorite from Abigail in St George

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Utah used a really awesome castronaut

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sticker here who doesn't love a cat on a

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flying saucer do astronauts believe in

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aliens well that's a good question I

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don't know some maybe do and some maybe

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don't I think it would be amazing to

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discover aliens in our lifetime from my

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perspective aliens probably don't look

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like little green men but they might be

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like tiny microorganisms that live or

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used to live on a planet like Mars

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unequivocally 100 I believe in aliens

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there is no way that you can be on the

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space station going around the earth and

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look out at night and see millions of

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stars and not think for certain there

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are aliens out there and people ask me

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if I've ever seen an alien and I say

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absolutely 100 I've seen aliens because

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you're looking at them every night when

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you look out in the night sky somewhere

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out there there is some crazy

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civilization doing some crazy work that

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we haven't discovered yet I know it is

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out there thank you all so so much for

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the letters that you write to us it

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means so much to receive them and I love

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reading every single one thank you these

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letters are the rocket fuel that we use

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this is what keeps us going so please

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don't stop setting them please keep

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sending them and help us push this

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Mission forward because it's super

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important thank you thanks everybody for

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all your letters and your awesome

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questions the curiosity is awesome and I

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hope you stay engaged in thinking about

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how the world and the universe works

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thank you for your letters keep them

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coming have a great holiday I am so

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thankful to uh to be back here on Earth

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with my family and friends and I wish

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you all the best this holiday season as

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you spend time with your family with

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your friends on our incredible Planet

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our home the Earth

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[Music]