• Question: If the ISS is traveling 4.76 miles/s how do the astronauts get in and out if it;s going so fast? Also could you tell me some information on the ISS? Please

    Asked by CDB2004 to Deborah, Euan, Maheen, Rob, Stu on 15 Jun 2016.
    • Photo: Rob Stanley

      Rob Stanley answered on 15 Jun 2016:

      The astronauts also have to be going that fast. Imagine a car chase in a movie, if both cars are going at the same speed next to each other it’d be possible to jump from the roof of one to the roof of the other. (But astronauts don’t jump, there’s a airlock instead.) For getting to the ISS, the spaceship (a Russian Soyuz spaceship) has to very carefully match the speed and position of the ISS, before it can dock.

      The only other facts I know about the ISS are that there’s a British astronaut up there at the moment (but he’s coming back soon). And they just managed to inflate a new room, like a balloon.

    • Photo: Euan Allen

      Euan Allen answered on 18 Jun 2016:

      Hi CDB2004, that’s a great question.

      Like Rob said, the rocket that the astronauts are on has a special path that it takes (which we calculate with a massive computer) that ensures that they are travelling as fast as the ISS when they get close to it. This makes it easy to dock and get across onto the ISS.

      My favourite fact about the ISS is that it is about the size of a football pitch. It’s crazy to think about something that big, going that fast above our heads. If you want to find out more about the ISS, or look at some amazing pictures of it, then I recommend NASA’s information page on the ISS:
      https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

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