The International Space Station (ISS) is a floating laboratory that is manned by astronauts conducting vital science in microgravity.
At an altitude of approximately 250 miles and a moving speed of 17,500 mph, the ISS completes one orbit of Earth approximately every 93 minutes, which is 15.5 orbits every day. Given its position the ISS is certainly disconnected from many of the pleasures found on Earth's surface, and one of these pleasures is the joyous experience of eating fresh fruit. Up there fresh fruit is considered a delicacy.
However, a Russian cargo spacecraft arrived at the ISS over the weekend and delivered close to three tons of supplies, and included in those supplies was a small amount of fresh fruit. The moment was so monumental that it was captured on video and posted to ISS astronaut Matthew Dominick's X account. The short video showed a piece of an orange being pushed toward Dominick in microgravity, resulting in a floating piece of orange that was consumed mid-air by the astronaut.
"We celebrate every bite with these infrequent treats," Dominick wrote in his post on Sunday
What are the astronauts aboard the ISS doing? For many years now astronauts aboard the ISS have been testing the growth of food within microgravity. The goal is to develop an understanding of how to effectively grow food in environments that lack gravity, which is critical to humans traveling for extended periods of time in space. The ISS is also home to many other forms of research, such as Earth photography, human research, and more.