To be fair, considering that there are minerals in the Moon that don't exist on Earth, it's normal that the human body experiments an allergic reaction to a set of substances that it hasn't ever been exposed to during thousands of years of evolution.
All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
141–150 of 288 posts
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, the ground on mars is literally toxic. Makes the concept of a Martian colony less appealing. Almost equal to a floating station on Venus. At least there you’d have the correct pressure. I seem to recall that the temperature on Venus at an altitude of one atmospheric pressure is manageable. It’s just also acidic. Possibility easier to deal with than perchlorates.
Sadly we underestimate the liveability of this Earth. Muskism makes people believe to the false premise that we can just buy a new planet, make it habitable with magical tech. Supported with pseudoscientific buzzwords like Terraforming etc. So we can recklessly consume this planet and jump to our new home when this one depletes. No need to care about our current home because it's a jumping board. Interesting as an ol…
One of the worst things Musk did is link himself in peoples’ minds to things like space exploration and then linked these ideas to… other ideas I’m not going into on here.
All these ideas about space pre-date him by many decades.
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that required? Could the suit itself be used as a type of airlock, to leave outside things outside? For example, mounting yourself onto a wall, then the back/whatever of the suit opens to the inside, and you hop out? (yes, there would be some dust recovery required, but minimal in comparison)
The challenge with the "suits stay outside" model is that you basically need some kind of airlock between the suit hatch and the ship hatch. You might imagine both hatches get contaminated when the suit is detached. Then when you dock, that whole between-hatch space needs to be decontaminated before you can open the two hatches, because the outside of the suit hatch brought that stuff into the airlock. Someone else l…
It looks like that requires a panel to move out of the way. I was thinking more like "zipper" (probably more of a contiguous interface), so closer to zero volume when attaching, then it "unzips"/splits and pulls the back of the suit open, into the cabin.
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| /\
| to | |
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Since the inside of the suit is already at pressure, you could just pop it open and step out.
The near-zero volume of the coupling would make things much easier to clean/isolate.
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#144I recall an article from a long time ago that basically said “astronauts report” the moon smells like spent gunpowder and outer space smell like… I think it was ozone. What they were actually reporting was the smell of the airlocks after they returned from their excursions. The moon has no atmosphere, so it has been accumulating dust from billions of years of asteroid impacts that have never come in contact with oxyg…
the detail that kills me is moon dust has never contacted oxygen in billions of years, so every time an astronaut came back inside they were essentially doing a chemistry experiment for the first time. the whole moon is just waiting to react with air
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#145Hourly cost doesn’t seems the right metrics, instead the cost should be tied to productivity or difficulty of problem solved
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#146Lunar dust is Kiki while earth dust is bouba.
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
Photocopiers smell like ozone when they run if anyone’s forgotten the smell Those are similar but sweeter. If I sterilize a room with UV it has a very distinct smell like nothing else aside from lightening and stun guns. I would UV the bathroom right now but then I have to vent the entire house and its 34F outside right now.
Side quest: Can you tell more about the UV sterilisation thing? Why do you do that? How often? Where? It seems like such a specific thing to do.
Hi, i am not who you asked, but i feel like i've done enough research and have some warnings. UV-C light itself is antimicrobial, but only for surfaces that the light touches, and in the case of cloth it needs to penetrate a bit.
There are at least two types of UV-C light bulbs, as well as literal ozone generators that use ceramic platen and a fan. The type of UV-C bulb that is most common on Amazon and Ali is ~254 nanometers, and _does not_ produce Ozone. It does leave a smell, but it's more like an oldschool hospital antiseptic smell. probably the smell of the dead germs, yay.
Now 185nm is actually the correct size to turn O2 around the bulb into O3 (and more oxygens too, i once read, i think, kinda like cracking hydrocarbons to make longer chains or something).
UV-C bulbs (not base, which is an edison base) that can sterilize a room in 5-15 minutes are about 15-20 CM tall, with four crystal tubes that are connected together standing up on the base. image here [0]
you must run a fan over them if you want your money's worth. they get hot, the bases get hot, it makes the most sense in non-carpeted rooms to aim the crystal down and the base up, so that is real rough on them. that took me 2 bulbs to figure out.
If you can find a reputable place to get the box with ceramic and a fan that lasts more than 5 minutes, let me know, because that's closer to what i want for bedrooms and stuff.
The UV-C 185nm bulbs work great to make a car stop stinking, too! completely removes cigarette smells, if the car hasn't been smoked in for a while. run the A/C full blast and run the bulb for 15 minutes, open the windows for 5 minutes, roll em, sniff. Still smell? another 10 minutes, in the back seat, full A/C blasting. vent, sniff. Faint smell? replace the cabin air filter. Charge customer(?)
and i'm going to respond to your followup question to the GP as well: Covid. Obviously. They were telling us it would live on groceries and deliveries and that, so i put all deliveries in my laundry room and dosed em with UV-C for a minute. CDC or whatever studies said that 10-60 seconds was more than enough to kill sars-ncov-2.
I only use it for freshening cars, rooms, bathrooms, etc now.
WARNING: Do not be in the room with any UV-C light for more than a few seconds. Do not look at the bulb for literally any more than necessary to ensure it is on and safe. they make safety goggles that wrap your entire eye sockets to protect from UV, too. if you get a 185nm bulb, either completely ventilate the room with fresh air, or leave it sealed for 60 minutes then open it up for a few minutes, all the ozone reacts and goes away or something.
UV-C hurts your skin, yes, but it will make your eyeballs literally itch. so don't, don't don't look at it. they are not blacklights.
[0] https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71LgjON7J+L._AC_.jpg
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
the swings?
Assuming they mean the ground acts as a heat sink, and sufficiently underground you’re not subjected to the above average heat of the day and below average cold of the night.
Isn't mercury tidally locked? Day is always day, night is always night.
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#149Mars has toxic levels of perchlorates in the regolith. That will require that humans never come in contact with the regolith or things that touched it. Those space suits that dock to vehicles seem like a necessity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perchlorate#On_Mars
If we redefine our community to include tardigrades the outlook improves considerably.
Example: a blog critiquing Mars colonization pointed out that humans cannot even live at the summit of Everest, and there is no "non-native microbial life" there. Notice the caveat: "non-native?" Guess who else did:
Tardigrade in Hawaiian shirt, wearing pixelated sunglasses
Honestly, which achievement would be considered more impressive-- Neil Armstrong setting foot on the Moon, or me getting there first because I was stuck to the bottom of his boot?
Well, guess who is now watching you navigate to the Wikipedia tardigrade article[1]:
Tardigrade lowers its pixelated glasses
Hell, in the five minutes that I've imagined them joining the team we've gone from
"never come into contact with the regolith"
to
"if you happen to come into contact with the regolith, remember: stop, drop, and roll."[2]
1: Ok, a tardigrade was probably not on his boot for the first Moon walk. But suppose we gently placed some the surface of the Moon, and observed their reaction...
two tardigrades pointing at you navigating back to Wikipedia
Re: All 12 moonwalkers had "lunar hay fever" from dust smelling like gunpowder (2018)
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
Without massive terraforming all of Mars is very hostile. But having solid ground is still nice. A workable compromise is making big habitats in a dome, that gives sunlight, but shields from radiation. And the ground needs to be processed obviously. The advantage of Venus to me is is gravity.
I wonder if it will turn out to be easier to adapt lifeforms to the planets than to try to adapt the planets to the lifeforms.
Neither is realistic; living on the Moon or Mars or any other planet is a fantasy.