Back from space, Jessica Meir says Earth needs our help!
Do you remember Jessica, the astronaut? She’s home!
Jessica Meir spent 7 months on the International Space Station, looking down on Earth. Now she has a message for us – to look after our planet.
At WoW! we spoke about Jessica last year when she talked about how to make dreams come true.
When she was 5, she drew a picture of herself walking on the Moon. Now she has been into space. And Jessica is still dreaming of becoming the first woman to walk on the Moon. Maybe in a couple of years…
For the past few weeks, Jessica and her two crewmates watched from above as billions of us on Earth had to stay at home to stop corona virus.
Now Jessica is back home in America and she finds that down here we’re all living indoors – like astronauts!
She misses hugging her friends. And if we complain about our hair growing too long, she says: “I haven’t had my hair cut since last July!”
“How precious our Earth is”
Jessica had some tips from space for us all on how to stay well in confinement. But her really big message from space was this.
She told NBC television:
“Looking down on the planet and everyone you know, every place you’ve ever been, every experience you’ve ever had, everything is down there.
That makes us appreciate … how precious our Earth is – and that we do truly need to protect it.”
“That tiny pea…”
All astronauts say that seeing Earth from space makes them feel how much they love our home and hate that people fight over it and damage our little blue planet.
The first person in space, Yuri Gagarin, came home and said: “I saw how beautiful our planet is. People, let us preserve and increase this beauty.”
Neil Armstrong, the first man on the Moon, said that up in space the Earth seemed tiny – and each one person, even tinier:
“That tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.”
“Spaceship Earth”
We particularly like this description, from Nicole Stott, another astronaut.
Her son was 7 when she was first in space. She told him:
“Imagine … the brightest light bulb you’ve ever seen and you splatter it with all the colours that you know Earth to be. And you turn it on and … it’s just so stunning, so glowing and bright and vibrant.”
The Earth, says Nicole, is like a spacecraft:
“Your planet is your spaceship.
It provides you with all the life support you need. And we have to choose to live like crew members, so that we can all survive.”
So while Jessica rests, we hope you have some time to look through WoW!
Just for an example, meet Jose Adolfo, Arthur, Stephanie, Ash and others in our annual review. Or say hello to Wave, who farms seaweed to save our oceans from plastic waste – and tune in on Sunday to our WoW! News podcast, when we’ll look again at promising solutions for healthier seas.
With WoW! you’ll always find loads of people with great ideas to share with you for making Spaceship Earth even better!
Problem?
We are using up our planet’s treasures and throwing a lot away; it’s easy to think one person makes no difference. But if we don’t change things, it will get worse.
Solution!
We can’t all go into space and see our little Earth like Jessica. But imagine it! We all feel love for our home. And if we show our love, even in small ways, we can save the world!
Grown-up follow-ups…
You can watch Jessica speak to NBC or read her interview with Vanity Fair.
Read this intriguing Guardian piece on an experiment to mimic the effect of awe which astronauts experience on seeing Earth.
And enjoy this video of the “Overview Effect” on astronauts:
