Living in space can be an unforgettable experience for astronauts. In addition to tense and exciting, outer space also save the horror side. This is revealed by Peggy Whitson, a NASA woman astronaut who has lived in space for 665 days. Her eyes were teary every time she got an offer to go to space again, Peggy just does not want to repeat life in space because she very avoids the space station toilet.
Peggy loves all her work on the ISS. Starting from installing battery components in the station's solar panel to taking samples of mysterious microbes. "The ISS is not like a hotel, it might be more appropriate if I call a camping trip," said Peggy began her story to Business Insider last September 2016.
According to Peggy, ISS toilet is not as severe as the Maximum Absorbency Garment used by astronauts in Apollo mission to the moon. However, Russian-made toilets worth 19,000 US dollars was considered terrible.
"If you want to pee it is easy. There is a funnel equipped with a fan to suck urine so it does not float," she said. But if you want to do something other than urinating, Peggy says it is something more challenging and creepy. All the ISS astronauts use the toilet with a small hole equipped with a fan to suck poop.
Once done, the poop will be sealed in a plastic bag and waiting to be discarded on the day of the space dump. "If the bag is full, you should wear rubber gloves and pack it," she said. "Sometimes the toilets also have problems, so the astronauts have to catch a variety of floating poop," said Peggy with winced
In the end, all the waste including the astronauts' excrement will be dumped into the ISS cargo ships and burned in the Earth's atmosphere. Approximately 80 to 85 percent of urine has been successfully recycled into drinking water and the rest into salt-scented rubbish. If you're still curious, watch a video from the Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti..
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