Q1: Do astronauts get hazardous duty pay if they actually fly in space?
Q2: The two astronauts who launched on June 5 were supposed to spend 8 days in space, but their mission has been extended to about 93 days because Boeing (see below). Expecting to be away from your family and all your favorite restaurants for about a week is one thing; finding out that you won’t be home for almost 13 weeks is a big ol’ kick in the teeth. Are these two going to get some kind of bonus pay for being stuck up there that long?
I’d be more concerned about their supplies while they’re up there. Pack for a week, stay several months? The clothing and personal care supply situation must be getting grim, and I worry about food and water even more since this mess was so totally unplanned-for.
do you work with me? Because I was just talking about this subject a couple hours ago.
I think they get a flat salary, plus flight pay. An astronaut’s job is basically 24 hours while in space, and definitely not 9-5 while on the ground.
But it wasn’t unplanned for. That’s why they are at the station comfortable, and not floating away in the timeless void of space with only their suits.
I think that resupply flights are still going on, too. The problem is that the vehicle they were supposed to use now isn’t considered reliable enough to put humans on one. But you need a much lower threshold of reliability to launch unmanned with just some supplies: If it fails, you’re just out the cost of that rocket, and launch another one.
I was under the impression that storage space and weight restrictions didn’t allow for much if any reserve supplies on a space station.
Nice to know they’ve got the unmanned resupply ships. This doesn’t seem to get mentioned in press coverage of the stranded astronauts, how they’re getting necessities.
I don’t know, but I have a colleague who was a mission specialist on the shuttle on the 90s. He said, being the government, he couldn’t do anything without orders. I have seen his temporary duty orders that transferred him from Houston to Low Earth Orbit via Cape Canaveral. He was moderately concerned that the orders did not specify return.
And, yet, people want to make fun of NASA for sending up 100 tampons
It’s not as if every flight that carries astronauts to the ISS also brings the necessities for these astronauts; that wouldn’t be enough to resupply the station (which needs not only food and water for the astronauts, but also spare parts, equipment for experiments and fuel for the thrusters that have to be fired occasionally to maintain the orbit). It would also be a rather inefficient way to maintain the station since a manned flight is much more expensive, per kilogram of payload, than an unmanned one. So there are unmanned flight going on a regular basis.
For what it’s worth, I saw an interview with the family of one astronaut asking how they’re dealing with the stress of the situation, and the reply was basically, Stress? They’re astronauts, space is their happy place, I’m sure they’re like pigs in shit up there. (Paraphrased.) Of course this could just be putting a positive spin on things, but they seemed sincere.
Incorrect. The ISS has on ongoing rotation of supplies up and trash down/ burned up.
It is true that the nominal storage space is undersized for the mission. Some of this is accommodated by the resupply vehicles serving as storage as supplies are used. Also, just about every nook and cranny is packed to the gills.
I’ve discussed this with planning for future missions, and some comparison has been made to the station in Antarctica. NASA could have used some better planning by analyzing Antarctica before designing the station. This experience will impact future mission design.
But supplies as far as food and water and oxygen and carbon dioxide filters and all life support equipment are planned out well ahead of time and go up in large batches, with contingency amounts should a particular flight not make it. They are not on a shoestring, just making it from flight to flight. NASA certainly had in it’s contingency plan what would happen if they made it to station and we’re unable to leave. Onboard supplies would be sufficient to cover 2 extra people for a couple of months and resupply would be scheduled such that some minor adjustments would smooth out the variance over time.
The other impact might be some schedule rotation as to who is active when, whether they need to share bunks, and access to the exercise equipment for their time to prevent health effects from extended weightless.
Their underclothes might need to serve a bit longer than typical until resupply, but those are the only real challenge to hygiene.
Astronauts for the most part sign up hoping to maximize their space time, because it is a unique experience that so few get. They will have made arrangements for the possibility the mission got held up indefinitely, as this is a new vehicle being tested.
So there might be some small stress associated with not coming back down to family, etc, but that is overwhelmed by the excitement of getting to do more of their thing. They likely faced more stress over what caused the problem than over any issue of being there longer.
