welcome back to 90's daybreak high above
us in space this morning the astronauts
aboard the shuttle columbia are taking a
break from their nonstop scientific
research they're scheduled to end the 16
day mission on sunday as colombia orbits
the earth the crew and ground
controllers have been conducting fluid
crystal and other experiments almost
around the clock but this morning while
there is a short break in the action up
there we have the good fortune to be
joined in a live hookup through nasa by
shuttle astronaut kent romiger who is
from del norte colorado a small town in
the san luis valley good morning to you
before we get started i want to good
morning to you all
do you have any messages for friends or
family here in colorado
hey i'd just like to thank everybody in
my hometown del oro colorado and
actually the whole valley for all the
support i understand when we went over
three hours after launch the
kids from my high school were on the
field with a sign that said hi kent
i wasn't able to see it but i've got
photos of it maybe in the photos i'll be
able to it'll show up
great yeah they were i guess it was
pretty neat well yesterday on one of our
newscasts we asked viewers to call in
and give us their questions whatever
they would like to ask you so we'd like
to pose a couple of them to you this
morning one viewer wanted to know what's
it like in outer space is it cold hot
and how does it feel to float around up
there
uh the floating around is tremendous
i'll try to show you a little bit of
that now you can see i'm floating right
here and it really is one of the neatest
feelings i've ever had
as far as colder hot inside the space
shuttle we keep the temperature very
reasonable similar to what you have
there on earth if i were outside if i
were not in the sun it would be close to
100 degrees negative fahrenheit and if i
were in the sun it could be several
hundred degrees warmer than that but
inside here it's very comfortable
can't another viewer wants to know what
does it feel like when you lift off or
re-enter what does it feel like when you
hit zero gravity
it's a pretty amazing sensation because
when we lift off the there's a lot of
rumbling
a lot of vibrations and acceleration and
as a matter of fact the most
acceleration we have is right before we
were in orbit so we're accelerating it
three times meaning that if i weighed
200 pounds on earth i weigh 600 pounds
just before the engines cut off and when
they cut off i go from weighing 600
pounds to zero pounds and free floating
it's quite a sensation
i can't imagine it's better than the
best roller coaster i would guess well
let's ask you one of the viewers wanted
to know what kind of experiments you're
involved with and how that might affect
us back here on earth
the several experiments on the mid deck
i'm involved with and one of them is
called astral culture which
interestingly enough is growing five
tuber potatoes and the sandless valley
is potato country but the reason we're
doing this is on this space station
coming up and extended space travel
it's a great idea to have plants and be
able to grow our own food because the
food takes advantage and cleans up the
air takes the co2 out of it so we're
using one of those experiments
to see how the potatoes form in space
see if their starch content is correct
as well as the technology using it as a
technology demonstrator to see the most
efficient way to grow stuff in space
kent one more question another viewer
wants to know what kinds of things do
you see up there as far as i i know
you're surrounded by stars but have you
seen comets or anything else like that
i haven't seen comets but what is really
interesting from up here are falling
stars in
the falling stars are below us so when
we look at the earth at night we'll see
these huge bright green and blue stars
that burn it seems like for close to 10
seconds as they're entering the
atmosphere and blowing up
well that's just terrific we want to
thank you for joining us this morning i
know your options are limited up there
but you're going to do any
trick-or-treating at all today i mean it
is halloween
it is halloween and we're working on our
costumes hopefully later on tonight
we'll send down some video of
our halloween party on board
okay
thank you for joining us we have lots of
fans in colorado that are pulling for
you have a safe return to earth next
sunday i guess have a good one thanks
kent
happy halloween and thanks for all the
support
okay take care
give me a minute
to a teeter's handover
redeploy the drop
copy that two and three
that's affirmative allen you'll probably
still need to look at the z-axis and
come in with one of the injectors
i just wish that i just saw that
you