NASA Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams shared their experience on the ISS with AccuWeather's Bernie Rayno as they await their hopeful return home later this month.
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00:00Bernie, we have you loud and clear.
00:03Great to have you with us on International Space Station today, and we are curious, how
00:07is the weather down there?
00:08Well, the weather is fantastic.
00:11You're missing a little spring fever across most of the country here, but you know what?
00:17I think the view where you are is much better than me.
00:21Yes, we do have a good view.
00:23You're probably right about that.
00:25And Butch, you've both done spacewalks.
00:28Now Butch, can you describe what it is like to leave the space station and go into space?
00:35I can share what the experience is like, but I cannot adequately describe it.
00:39That's really impossible.
00:40I mean, you think about, you put on literally a one-man space capsule, because that's what
00:45those spacesuits are, and we go out into the vacuum of space and work.
00:51And the view, again, is spectacular looking out of the window.
00:54But you think about a 180-degree bubble helmet and seeing the view from that vantage point,
00:59and knowing that you're the only two people in the entire universe that's doing something
01:03at that, doing that specific thing at that moment, it's very, very special.
01:08Very difficult to put into words, like I said, but a special, spectacular, a couple of adjectives
01:14that come to mind.
01:15Well, obviously, you both have a bird's-eye view of the Earth.
01:19Now, can you see weather patterns or meteorological effects on Earth from the ISS?
01:25Absolutely.
01:26You know, when we came up here in the summertime, of course, it was getting a little bit heated
01:31in the Atlantic, so we saw all sorts of hurricanes, you know, making their way from Africa, coming
01:37across the ocean, some of them going up in the Gulf Stream, some of them crossing into
01:42the Gulf.
01:43So, yeah, of course, we saw all sorts of activity.
01:46It's been amazing to see what weather is going on around our planet.
01:51And your return to Earth, expected to be later this month.
01:55What are you missing most, and what are you looking forward to when you get back?
02:02I think I miss the ministry aspect through my local church.
02:06That's something I miss, obviously.
02:08Of course, family.
02:09That kind of goes without saying.
02:10I mean, that's pretty much a no-brainer there.
02:12You would understand that.
02:13I think that up here, you kind of miss the smell of fresh-cut grass and those type of
02:17things that you kind of take for granted a little bit, and you don't have that up here.
02:21So looking forward to just some of those basics.
02:24Yeah, I'll add to that.
02:26I actually really do miss weather.
02:28I really miss, of course, my family, but I miss my dogs, and part of the reasons I miss
02:33my dogs is I get to take them on a walk.
02:35And when I take them on a walk, you know, sometimes it's raining.
02:38Sometimes it's windy.
02:39Sometimes it's hot.
02:40But I'm looking forward to feeling all that weather from Earth.