Lord of the Wrings

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield’s latest video from the International Space Station answers the question — What happens when you wring out a wet washcloth in a zero gravity environment? 

The experiment was designed by two Nova Scotia high school students, Kendra Lemke and Meredith Faulkner.

Despite the surprising result of Hadfield’s demonstration, a few droplets do visibly escape off-camera, which made me think about the whole dining, hygiene and waste cycle aboard the space station. How do they prevent mold?

As a student living in a basement apartment one summer in Bowling Green, Ohio I had my own troubles getting rid of water. The humidity was such that once a washcloth or anything else got wet it never dried out until it went through a dryer at the Laundromat. Hadfield doesn’t get the option of the college student’s solution — moving out after three months and letting the landlord figure it out.

[Thanks to John King Tarpinian for the story.]