An update on Chris Hadfield’s condition by Raffi Kuyumjian, CSA’s Chief Medical Officer and Hadfield’s Flight Surgeon
Chris’ readaptation is going well and he continues to improve on a daily basis. His walk is more and more confident, the dizziness he was feeling is fading away every day and he is in good spirits!
He has a full day today of science data collection, amongst others, EEG recordings to evaluate how his sense of orientation and coordination are re adapting to gravity (see photo). He will also have a medical check with an ECG to evaluate his heart, as well as an eye ultrasound and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) of his eyes. These special eye examinations have become routine for all returning astronauts, since some of them have shown decreased vision during and after spaceflight, but the causes remain unclear. It is important to understand these and find ways to mitigate them before we consider longer duration missions to Mars for example.
The day will end with the usual 2-hour reconditioning session with the CSA exercise specialist Natalie Hirsch.
In this photo : Chris Hadfield wears a fancy helmet to measure brainwave changes as part of a neurological experiment of the European Space Agency (ESA).
Photo credit: Raffi Kuyumjian/CSA
Maybe this helmet is used to verify if Chris Hadfield gained strange powers after exposure to cosmic rays…
An update on Chris Hadfield’s condition by Raffi Kuyumjian, CSA’s Chief Medical Officer and Hadfield’s Flight Surgeon
Chris is already showing noticeable improvement in his walk and equilibrium since yesterday, but it usually takes about 3 weeks until we are confident a returning astronaut can return to driving. He will be driven to where he needs to be until then.
Today is a bit of a lighter day for Chris to help him recover from effects of gravity, as well as the jet-lag and the 24-hour flight to Houston from the landing site. He has a medical check, a 2-hour reconditioning session and short debrief meetings in addition to this morning’s press conference. He needs the rest as tomorrow is a full day of science data collection, medical checks and reconditioning.
Chris Hadfield: “How does the body control blood pressure? Scarecrow on a tilt table to measure how.”
Photo credit: Chris Hadfield
You can also see this article about his return. Not easy to feel gravity again !
Tom and Chris in the final stages of readying the suits and airlock for their spacewalk. A full day’s prep.
Yesterday (May 11), these two astronauts carried out a hastily arranged spacewalk today to replace what may have been the source of an ammonia leak in the cooling system of the International Space Station. More details here.
