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Space Station Science

Picture of the Day

May 2, 2003

Homeward Bound
Don Pettit (front), Nikolai Budarin (left), Ken Bowersox (right)

May 2, 2003: The 3-man crew of ISS Expedition 6, pictured above, will
return to Earth on May 3rd after a 5-month adventure on the space
station. Science Officer Don Pettit shared his thoughts on the eve of
departure: 


Homeward Bound by Don Pettit

"It is now time to go home. As much as I like being here, I realize
that this is not home, and it is time to return. There are new
frontiers to explore on Earth as a family. There are two little boys
with wide-open eyes ready to explore the world, and it is time for me
to be there and learn with them. It is always best to stop an
endeavor while you are still in the midst of enjoyment; this will
leave the best memories and instill a strong desire to do it all over
again." 

"The feeling of being home is directly proportional to how far you
have traveled. When you go out to dinner, you feel home when you pull
into the driveway. When you go for a drive to a state park some
distance out of town, you feel home when you enter the outskirts of
your city. When you drive across the United States, perhaps on one of
those memorable family vacations, you get this warm feeling of being
home when you cross over your state line. When you go on
international travels, particularly when returning from places with
radically different cultures, you feel home the first place your
airplane lands on U.S. soil. You may still be 2,000 miles from home,
but you have this wonderful sensation in your heart that speaks out
to you." 

"After having been on Space Station for nearly six months, we will be
returning on the Soyuz spacecraft and be landing on the desert plains
of Kazakhstan. When our capsule goes thump on those desert flats, we
will be literally on the opposite side of the world, nearly 12,000
miles from home. Yet once normal breathing resumes, we will have this
warm sensation inside that we are home. I can picture sometime in the
future, a crew will be returning from Mars and after inserting
themselves into low Earth orbit, perhaps from an aero-braking
maneuver, they will look down from their orbital vantage point at
this blue jewel circling below and say, 'We are home.'" 

"We will be returning home on the Soyuz spacecraft. Unlike the Space
Shuttle, there is precious little room for personal effects. I can
return with perhaps three small items that will fit in my pocket.
What will I choose? The combination pocket tools I brought engraved
with my boys' names? There is one for each. I have been using them
for my Space Station repair work and figured the boys would like to
have something that daddy used to repair Space Station. I can picture
my boys using them at Boy Scout jamboree. Should I return with my
wife's favorite necklace, a small part of her that I brought along,
much like before a great battle, a knight might keep the handkerchief
from his lady? When I have periodically looked at this necklace,
pleasant memories would come to mind. And I would smile." 

"After careful thought, I decided to bring none of these items home.
I can always replace the pocket tools and I can buy my wife another
necklace. There is no room for this kind of sentiment in the Soyuz
spacecraft. What I have decided to bring home is truly unique to
Space Station, something money and a trip to the shopping mall can
never replace. I have decided to bring home my spoons. I have three
Russian-made spoons. They are simple in design, being unpretentiously
stamped from stainless steel. A small square embossed into the handle
is the only visible marking. There is a hole in the handle for
attaching a string so it won't float away. In space, it is not good
to lose your spoon. While seemingly a good idea, eating with strings
attached is a pain so we take our chances with the universe and cut
our strings. What are truly unique about these spoons are their
gracefully long handles. They are twice as long as a normal spoon yet
the spoon part is standard teaspoon-sized. They allow one to
gracefully shovel in dinner from deep plastic food pouches without
getting your fingers all sticky-gooey with the stuff you are
attempting to eat. They will make great camping spoons." 

"Using these long handled spoons, I can picture my boys and I sitting
around a campfire, eating beans out of the fire-charred can they were
cooked in. As we chat about our world, our eyes will follow the
sparks as they rise in the draft of hot air. Perhaps we will look at
the stars and see Space Station pass overhead." 

Credits & Contacts
Author: Dr. Tony Phillips 
Responsible NASA official: Ron Koczor 
Production Editor: Dr. Tony Phillips 
Curator: Bryan Walls 
Media Relations: Catherine Watson

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