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station this is houston officially are

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houston this is station we're ready

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voice of america this is houston please

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call station for a voice check

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station this is voice of america how do

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voice of america this is the

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international space station we hear you

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loud and clear welcome aboard

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thanks very much i take it this is

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this is wheels yes doug wheelock aboard

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the space station welcome great thank

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you very much

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well thank you all for your time this

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morning and actually my first question

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is for scott

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um when i spoke to your fellow

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astronauts a few weeks ago they said it

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takes about three to four weeks for your

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body to adjust to life on the station

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and i was wondering how are you

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you know i think i've been up here i

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think it might be three weeks today

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actually and uh i feel uh really good i

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think

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i

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week ago

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where i felt like maybe i wouldn't feel

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any differently two or three or four

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weeks from now but uh

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i would imagine i'll still continue to

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improve a little bit but so far so good

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what are some of the oddities that you

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you mean besides my fellow crew members

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yes besides your fellow crew members

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well you know uh my first two previous

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flights were on a space shuttle and they

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were short the race flights and one

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thing i noticed there was that if i

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turned upside down inside the space

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shuttle for instance it would take some

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time maybe like five minutes before my

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reference frame shifted to where now the

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the ceiling was the floor

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and and vice versa but you know after

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being up here for a few weeks now it's

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interesting to note that if i you know

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flip 180 degrees around i can notice the

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instant

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where that reference frame changes

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and all of a sudden you know i feel like

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you know the the ceiling is the floor or

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vice versa so it's interesting to see

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the difference from being up here for uh

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you know uh

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more time than just a normal shuttle

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flight

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and speaking of shuttles you guys have

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the discovery heading up to you um

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coming up on

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sorry blasting off on monday and i know

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it's bringing with it the final unit

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sorry the final us component of the

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space station how do you guys feel about

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the fact that the space station or at

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least the u.s portion of it is about to

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hi this is shannon i think we're all

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very excited about the completion of the

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u.s side of the space station

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it's it's essentially completed now in

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terms of laboratory space and so with

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the the final closet being put on we'll

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have

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a

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down to the business of doing science

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which is what the space station's all

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about

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and actually discovery's bringing one

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other piece robonaut 2 and i was

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wondering what your thoughts are about

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interacting with the first humanoid

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well we're going to wait and see if how

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we how he blends in and see if he's a

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good neighbor with us but we're looking

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forward to uh to working with our

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engineers on the ground that have

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developed this

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robonaut and uh and just to see what its

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capacity is and how it can assist us on

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board and uh so we're excited to uh to

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welcome our new crew member aboard

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and i i know that some of you tweet and

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i was wondering um if any of you follow

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hey this is astrowheels on twitter

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i have not been able to do that just a

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matter of matter of time really and

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i i understand that he's been tweeting

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it's been tweeting and

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and but i haven't had a chance to look

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and what are your thoughts um with it

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being discovery's last mission what are

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your thoughts about the future of nasa

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and the future of space flight and that

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well it is it is sad in a way to see the

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shuttle uh um uh

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us moving out of the shuttle era and uh

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saying goodbye to discovery for the last

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time and uh it is a little sad but uh

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change is not always a bad thing for us

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moving on as an agency of course now the

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the space station will take a center

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stage pretty much as our as our orbiting

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laboratory and it'll will happen in full

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utilization bringing back the science

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to earth that we originally planned for

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for the space station and we'll look

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forward to uh to a future vehicle that

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will take us a little bit further into

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space and help us discover more things

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and i think we've got a very very

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exciting future for our kids that lay

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ahead

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for us and

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and it's going to be exciting to see

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anyone else want to take that question

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well uh certainly i agree with uh uh

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wheels here on um

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you know we're we're a little bit uh sad

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uh as we

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look towards the end of the space

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shuttle program and but you know i think

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we need to re reflect back on its

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successes it's been an amazing uh

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vehicle

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um

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very very uh you know sophisticated to

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can do a bunch of different missions but

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you know we want to move away from low

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earth orbit and the shuttle it's

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impossible to do that with the space

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shuttle so in today's uh

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you know fiscal environment if we if we

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decide to do

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uh you know to start a new program

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unfortunately we have to retire another

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one so a little bit sad but it's very

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and shannon

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i'm not sure i have much to add to uh

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what wilson scott have already said it

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it is it is of course sad but i also

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understand the necessity of um ending

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the shuttle program so we can go do

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other things and and i think we do need

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to do those other things i think we need

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to do them

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for humankind and i look forward to

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being a part of it

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and shannon what

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i know right now that you're acting as a

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human test subject among conducting

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other research is there a particular

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project you're most excited about that

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i actually like some of the nutrition

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studies that we're doing we've known for

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a long time how

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being in space for long duration affects

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your muscle mass and your bone density

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and

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there's been a lot more research on the

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ground that looks at tweaking people's

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nutrition that can actually have a

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positive or negative effect on a

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person's bone density and so being part

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of those some of those studies i think

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is is very interesting to me because

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it's perhaps a simple solution to some

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of the problems we have

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with osteoporosis and other other issues

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facing us on the ground

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well great thank you all so much for

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your time today and for all your efforts

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up there and

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good luck to you with the rest of your

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well voice of america thank you so much

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for joining us it's great to spend time

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with you and have a great rest of the

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week

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you too

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you