They may be outside of the Earth but that does not mean they can't celebrate the holiday season as well. Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) sent their Christmas greetings and talked about their plans including what they ate on board.
Space.com reported that the astronauts' families sent gifts to the six-person crew. It was delivered by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency's robotic H-II Transfer Vehicle 6, or HTV-6, earlier this month.
It was noted that, since the spacecraft orbits the Earth every 92 minutes, the crew will see an estimate of 15 sunrises throughout the day. This means that they actually had witnessed 15 Christmas mornings in less than a day.
The astronauts were given the day off for Christmas as well as for Dec. 26, unlike on Thanksgiving Day where they went straight to work just like any other day. Dan Huot, the spokesperson for NASA, also confirmed that the astronauts have Sundays off.
According to Universe Today, this year is another milestone for Space Christmas since this is Expedition 50. This means that Pesquet, Whitson and the others are the 50th crew to reside on board since the station began operations on 1998.
Last Dec. 20, NASA posted a video of three crewmembers talking about what this season means for them. Thomas Pesquet, a French astronaut, talked about his family in France and their tradition of his grandmother cooking huge meals for him and his 25 cousins.
It was also revealed that the astronauts will have traditional American holiday food such as turkey, green beans, potatoes, corn bread stuffing as well as fruit salad. However, instead of plates, they will be eating out of cans and pouches instead.
For dessert, they also had gingerbread cookies, chocolate cake and hot cocoa. Pesquet shared some French delicacies with his crew mates such as the chicken supreme with morels and ox tongue.
Peggy Whitson revealed how being on board the ISS gave them a "slightly different perspective of Christmas." She also expressed her hope of humanity living as one people and striving for peace.
