Don’t play with your food
Jonathan Nally | Jul 10, 2010 | Comments 0
What do astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) do when they get bored? Have fun with food, of course!
The microgravity environment of orbit is the perfect place to perform tricks and experiments using anything that comes to hand, including what you’re about to eat. Here’s a light-hearted look some ISS astronauts and cosmonauts having a bit of fun. All images courtesy of NASA.

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Naoko Yamazaki squeezes a water bubble out of her beverage container, showing her image refracted, on the middeck of space shuttle Discovery while docked with the ISS. (April 2010)

Cosmonaut Oleg V. Kotov, Expedition 15 flight engineer from Russia's Federal Space Agency, with fresh fruit brought up via a Progress re-supply craft. Gives a whole new meaning to the term "food pyramid"! (May 2007)

JAXA astronaut Koichi Wakata, Expedition 20 flight engineer, holds chopsticks near food containers. (June 2009)

NASA astronaut T.J. Creamer, Expedition 22 flight engineer, pictured in the galley in the Unity node of the International Space Station. (Jan 2010)

Yum! Oleg Kotov and NASA astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson, flight engineer, open a delivery of fresh fruit and vegetables. (May 2010)

Astronaut Sandra Magnus and cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov, both Expedition 18 flight engineers, work with food storage containers in the Zvezda Service Module of the ISS. (Feb 2009)

A spoon-sized item of food floats freely in front of cosmonaut Fyodor N. Yurchikhin, Expedition 15 commander from Russia's Federal Space Agency. (May 2007)
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Filed Under: Featured stories • News Archive • Shuttle / Station • Spaceflight
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