(Music)
It’s Matt.
I guess I wanted to know what you did to prepare for the mission.
Well, when I was accepted to the Astronaut Corp, I spent about two and a half years as
an astronaut candidate just training in the basic skills required to be able to be eligible
for a mission.
Once I was assigned to this mission, I spend another two and a half years training specifically
for this mission learning the Russian language, space station systems, how to do spacewalks
and robotic arm training all the things I would need for this particular mission.
So in all, to get up here where I am today was about a five year training flow.
And that was spent not only at Johnson Space Center but with our International Partners
all over the world, Japan, Canada in Europe and in Russia.
So it’s been a tremendous experience.
Do you guys have internet on the space craft?
(Laughter)
You guys got Instagram, Facebook, what’s your handle?
Yeah, we do have internet, it’s a little slow but it’s workable.
And it’s a great capability, to communicate you know for things like social media but
also email.
My name on Instagram which is the same on Twitter is stationcdrkelly.
My question is what do you miss most about being on Earth?
The ability to just kind of go outside to go where you want to go, hop in your car and
go out to eat or just to go out for a walk with family is something that I do miss that
I guess I really didn’t think would be, that I’d miss that much with all the things
that we have the ability to do up here.
Being in space for this length of time, are there any punch up or anything like that?
Are you prepared to be in close quarters with everyone else?
No, I’ve never encountered that kind of thing.
You know NASA and their International Partners do a pretty good job in vetting the people
they send up here and we’re all pretty I think easy to get along with, especially in
this environment.
You know, those thing do happen, I’ve heard stories, of them happening, but I’ve never
experienced any of it personally.
Hello Commander, I just wanted to know, were you a kid that wanted to be an astronaut or
did it happen for you later?
You know I did, but I grew up in the New York, New Jersey metropolitan area, so I also wanted
to play baseball for the Mets and football for the Giants.
So yeah I did, but it was one of those goals I never thought I would actually you know
achieve or be in a position where I you know, could even be competitive so it wasn’t until
later in life, I was in the Navy as a Navy test pilot that I decided to apply and was
fortunate enough to get selected.
Hey Scott Kelly, I’ve heard so much about you from this lady right here.
All good things
But one thing I’m really really curious about I hope you can help me out here, what
is the infamous task that a pilot has to do on a shuttle mission?
I’m really curious about this so, if you could enlighten me that would be great.
I think what Tracy is probably joking about by asking that question and talking about
is the fact that the pilot of the space shuttle is responsible for the maintenance of the
toilet on the space shuttle.
And that might be funny to her, but the reason they have the pilot do that is it’s a critical
task that without a toilet you’re not going anywhere.
So they will only entrust that to the most talented and capable person on a space craft
(Laughter)
Thank you so much
(Laughter)
Music