No Matter Where You Go, There You Are

Here's a reprint of Elizabeth Kolbert's Project Exodus — What's behind the dream of colonizing Mars? 

File under: Flatland fantasies, technophilia, animal abuse, low-earth orbit, stupid human tricks, no bucks, no Buck Rogers

On March 27th, an American astronaut named Scott Kelly blasted off from Earth and, six hours later, clambered onto the International Space Station. He’s been there ever since. Each day, the I.S.S. orbits the planet fifteen and a half times, which means that after a month Kelly had completed more than four hundred and fifty circuits. By now, he’s made nearly a thousand.

Kelly, who is fifty-one, is short—five feet seven—and stocky, with a round face and a thin smile. If all goes well, he will not return to sea level until March, 2016. At that point, he will have set an endurance record for an American in space.

Even in brief bursts, space is tough on the human body. Changes in intracranial pressure can lead to eye problems. Weightlessness induces vertigo. Fluids collect in places they shouldn’t. Muscles atrophy and bones grow brittle. Astronauts’ internal organs drift upward and their spines extend. It is expected that by the time Kelly finally descends he will have stretched to five feet nine.