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this is wls can you hear us

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International Space Station and we sure

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can welcome to the International Space

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satellite we have astronauts Michael

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Hopkins and Rick is frocky Oh from the

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International Space Station how many

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we're 260 miles above the earth right

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now and now the interesting thing I

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think a lot of people from Illinois

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especially university-owned oi grads we

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remember that Michael Hopkins now a

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United States Air Force colonel and

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obviously an astronaut on the space

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station was a defensive back for the

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Fighting Illini and they were just

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talking about you I think you didn't you

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do a hit from space during one of their

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football games this fall yeah I had an

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opportunity actually to send quite a few

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messages down to the team during the

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season and it was absolutely great to to

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be able to communicate with them like

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that and actually enjoyed watching a lot

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of the games on the weekends I'm sorry I

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missed the last question yeah I've

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actually been up here a little over five

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months now and I only have a couple

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weeks left Rick and Koichi our other

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crewmates here in the US OS segment

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they've been up here about three months

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now I think what would you say is the

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hardest part of getting adjusted to

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microgravity well you know when you get

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up here the body goes through quite a

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few changes you get this fluid shift to

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your head so you get kind of a puffy

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head and before your body adjusts for

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that of course just getting used to the

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zero-g your vestibular system takes a

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few days I probably say that the

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vestibular system is probably the worst

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to get used to you sort of feel as

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though your c6 the whole time would that

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yeah a little bit just for just for a

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few hours some folks it takes a few days

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some folks only a few hours to adjust

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but yeah that's probably a good analogy

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I guess now Michael you're you're on

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your way back down in a couple of weeks

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and you're going to take the Soyuz down

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and land in Kazakhstan as part of the

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that's how people are now transiting

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back and forth to the ISS is it

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something that you're gonna miss you

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looking forward to coming back to earth

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where your emotions here yes all of the

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above I'm certainly going to miss being

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up here being here with Rick and Koichi

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and our Russian colleagues and the

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ability to to do all the work up here in

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microgravity work with the teams on the

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ground it's absolutely fantastic on the

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other hand I've been up here a while and

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it's it's time to go home and see the

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family start being a husband and a dad

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again

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imagine solid food is probably a good

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addition to your life too right I mean

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if you don't want to go down and like

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eat normally yeah I'm looking forward to

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some fresh produce probably have some

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pizza somewhere in there and maybe even

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a good Chicago style hot dog all right

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so as you're as you're there a couple

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weeks ago you guys had to go out and do

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some extra vehicular activity do a

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spacewalk looking to make sure that

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everything was was working properly had

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a little bit of a of an issue up there

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walk us through a little bit of what

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that's like when you when the when the

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red lights start going on and you

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realize there may be a problem onboard

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the space station I know down here in

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the press there was a lot of

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speculations you guys might actually

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have to abandon the space station for a

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while it turns out yeah I don't think

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you guys have ever thought that was

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going to happen but but what was that

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like in those first few moments or even

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days when you guys are trying to work

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that problem yeah the way the system

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works up here is when there's a failure

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of some kind we have a computer system

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that that turns on an audible alarm

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obviously and we get yellow and red

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indicators on a pan

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and when we hear the alarm we go and we

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check the computer to see what's going

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on very often we'll get these alarms are

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not very often once in a while we'll get

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these alarms and the ground will say oh

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that's a just a sensor problem or it's

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just a don't worry about it we'll take

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care of it and that's kind of how this

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one was was the ground call us at first

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and said no action on your part we're

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looking into it so at first I thought it

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was just a minor issue or just nothing

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no big deal

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but then as the hours went past and the

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days a couple of days later within a day

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or so we started getting rumblings that

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they're having problems with the cooling

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system and that's when we started to

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think okay their ground is trying to fix

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it and if they can't fix it

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spacewalk is gonna be the option to go

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go and replace some parts and that's

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when it started to get serious through

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that moment where you're getting all

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strapped up ready to go and get out

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there and you're I mean obviously any

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time you're doing that is it

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exhilarating is it scary what I mean

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obviously you're well trained so scary

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is sort of a relative term here but if

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you have that sort of it that tension

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when you're going out because you

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realize hey I'm in space and I gotta fix

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yeah actually again I'm going to answer

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all of the above you know one of the

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when I've playing football at Illinois

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one of the things I found the worst

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parts of the game was waiting for the

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game to start and I would say here and

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doing the spacewalk was kind of the same

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thing it takes a while for us to get to

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the point where actually open the hatch

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and go out the door and and that waiting

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is can be very difficult and that's when

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the emotions start to build up all of

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the excitement the the intensity the

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nervousness it all just starts to turn

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and then finally if when you get out the

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hatch and you're able just to start

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it's hard to pick one important the most

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important science or the most important

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research project that's going on up here

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you know we've got a wide wider variety

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of different types of research one of

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the most interesting for me I thought is

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we're doing some research on vaccines

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and how we're trying to develop new

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vaccines for a new for these you know

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super super bacteria that

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starting to pop up around the earth so

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it's not just to help the folks up here

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but it's also to help the folks on the

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ground so I think that's the kind of

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thing that I think is important for us

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to do a pair are things that not only

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help the space space travelers but also

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help the folks back on earth what would

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you say the coolest thing that you fly

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over in any given day what feature of

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Earth is it that they get your attention

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every time well that's a that's a tough

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question because there are so many

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amazing things to see on earth how about

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if I say Chicago well actually one of my

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favorite well one of my favorites is

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every time we fly over the Caribbean and

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you see just these incredible blue

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waters around the islands it truly is

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stunning but but again there are so many

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different things that we fly over there

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that are just truly incredible how many

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yeah we orbit the Earth every 90 minutes

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so 16 times a day we go around the earth

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thank you so much for your time where do

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you think NASA's future is going here do

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you think there'll be more long term

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duration kinds of flights like you guys

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are doing or Mars what do you think is

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well the near term we have of course

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many missions are going to be five to

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six months long and we're also going to

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start doing one-year missions we're

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going to send folks up here and stay up

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here for about a year and that's a

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prerequisite to going on to asteroid

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Moon or Mars and things like that you

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know we need to learn how the body how

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to keep the astronauts healthy in these

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long periods of time of course NASA is

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building a new vehicle you called the

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Orion and that vehicle is going to go

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beyond low-earth orbit to these other

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destinations like the moon asteroids and

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Mars so nASA has a bright future may

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take some time to get to these places

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but we continue to push in that

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direction thank you very much good luck

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up there and call us when you get back

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to earth I'll buy your hot dog and your

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pizza whatever you need sir sounds like