Syracuse native Jeanette Epps spent nearly eight months in space aboard the International Space Station. She and the rest of the NASA Space X Crew-8 spoke about their mission recently from Houston.
Epps said adjusting back to Earth’s gravity is difficult, emphasizing how you feel the heaviness of even simple actions like sitting in a chair.
“Even just the weight of your head and trying to hold it up and some of the muscle pains that you'll have because you haven't held your head up in what eight months almost for us,” Epps said.
The NASA Space X Crew-8 mission took more than 600,000 photos from space, witnessing the April 8 Solar Eclipse and a comet.
"It was amazing beautiful seeing the earth from that vantage point," Epps said. "But for me, one of the big things is that now I want to see trees, I want to see people, I want to touch things and experience things here on Earth more than I did before. And it's just made me appreciate things I think just a little bit more and the simple things, not the big things but the simple things in life that make me happy.”
Epps said young people dreaming of heading to space one day should understand it takes a lot of work but encouraged them to study and learn from others immersed in it.
“I think they need to pursue their dreams," Epps said. "You may not make it to space, but will you make it way further than if you had never pursued that dream.”
And she gave some love to the Salt City.
“I cannot thank my hometown more," Epps said. "I had so much love that was poured out from Syracuse."
After the Crew-8 mission splashed down, one astronaut spent the night in a hospital for an undisclosed medical issue. Citing medical privacy, NASA has not said which astronaut was hospitalized or for what reason.
