While preparing for a space flight, one of the biggest lessons astronauts learn is to never give in to their fears. But what if everyday emotions experienced on Earth become their biggest enemies up there? Similarly, a seasoned space traveler’s tears could’ve led him into big trouble, potentially costing him his life. During one of his missions to the International Space Station (ISS), Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who had worked closely with NASA, felt something odd in his left eye.
While Hadfield was spacewalking, his eyes welled up with tears due to pain and discomfort. The former commander of the ISS recalled in an interview with LBC how he was literally crying on his first cosmic excursion. He suggested that merely expressing his emotions in space could have cost him his life. The now-retired Canadian astronaut went “completely blind” for thirty minutes while at the same time clinging to the orbiting space outpost with one arm.
During a spacewalk, Hadfield felt irritation in his eye, and he later discovered that an oil and soap mixture had caused the burning sensation. Notably, the irritant mixture was common among astronauts to help them de-fog their visors. As reported by The Profile, the temporarily blinded astronaut was unable to clean his eyes as he was wearing his helmet. As his eyes continued to water, the tears, instead of rolling down his cheeks, turned into a big blob.
In the absence of gravity, the tear ball of heavy moisture eventually adhered to the astronaut’s eye. As a result, Hadfield had blurred vision while he was still floating in space while holding onto the ISS. “Despite what you’ll see in the movie ‘Gravity,’ in space, tears don’t fall. Instead, they accumulate into a large ball on the eye. This occurs because the tear gland, which secretes tears, continues to function, but the duct responsible for drainage does not work due to the absence of gravity,” he said in the LBC interview, adding that one would need a handkerchief to cry in space.
Within little time, the contamination spread from one eye to the other, and both snapped shut with the pain. “The ball becomes so big that the surface tension takes it across the bridge of your nose like a tiny little waterfall and goes ‘goosh’ into your other eye. And now I was completely blind outside the spaceship,” the outlet quoted Hadfield as saying. The temporarily blinded astronaut somehow reached out to NASA Mission Control in Houston, Texas, for help. The control room advised him to start venting his suit.
Describing it as a “nasty” situation, Hadfield eventually opened a vent on the side of his suit to let some oxygen out. “In fact, I was hissing my oxygen away into the universe while being blind and hanging onto the outside of the spaceship during my first spacewalk. Eventually, I cried enough to dilute the contaminant. Over time, as my tears continued to dilute it, I was able to start seeing again,” he shared, leaving the interviewer speechless.
Following this, the former Canadian Space Agency astronaut ceased venting his oxygen into the universe and went back to work as if nothing had happened. Speaking to The Profile, Hadfield revealed how his astronaut training taught him the biggest lesson, i.e., to prepare for the worst. “While play-acting grim scenarios day in and day out may sound like a good recipe for clinical depression, it’s actually weirdly uplifting. It takes a boldness of execution and an ability to overcome fear,” he explained. The veteran space traveler emphasized that fear is a symptom of a lack of preparation and that only competence can help overcome it.