“One’s mental health should be very strong while training for space missions. It is not just the gravity but your weight which becomes a concern. Adapting to zero-gravity is a challenge and when you enter back to the Earth’s orbit all your energy needs to change,” said India’s first astronaut to visit the International Space Station and Gaganyatri, Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla.
Sharing his experiences, insights and anecdotes of his training and flight for the Axiom-4 mission at the Future Makers Conclave at BTS on Thursday, Shukla said he had been training since 2020, that is four-and-half years, but when the rocket engine ignited, one forgets everything.
“You feel acceleration through your chest. It is eight times the acceleration that one experiences when you are on a motorbike on Earth. The acceleration multiplies 18-20 times in high altitude," he said.
"The body undergoes a lot of changes and this is what we are working upon for our upcoming missions. Then in space, all the learning is gone. There is a lot of disorientation for the first few days. The concept of space changes in space. After five-six days when you have settled down, things get easy and after 8-10 days the mind gets well trained. The problem starts when you are returning to Earth. Once you return, a lot of course correction needs to be done. The mind needs to be strong for all this,” he added.
During the 30-minute presentation, Shukla also shared videos he had shot of how the Earth and India looked like from the International Space Station.
