The Astronauts On The International Space Station Have Seen Things We People Wouldn't Believe

Have you watched this yet? German set designer and video artist Michael Konig used footage sent back from the International Space Station over the past three months to make an amazing high-definition, time-lapse video of the earth spinning from 240 miles away.

Some of the pictures are from the current Space Station mission, Expedition 29, manned by Satoshi Furukawa, Mike Fossum and Sergei Volkov. This clip of Furukawa being interviewed for Japanese television gives you a some idea of what it’s like for them up there. Watch Fossum’s cross necklace floating around in zero gravity, and listen to the excited oohs and aahs of the interviewers as Furukawa turns the camera out the window to show them what lightning looks like from beyond the earth’s atmosphere. And when the sun crests the curve of the horizon at the end, you learn how to say “Holy shit this is the most totally mind-blowing thing I have ever seen in my life” in Japanese. Or something pretty much like that.

And here is some soundless footage taken at night. Or, I guess, from this perspective, its less “night” than it is “while the earth is between the Space Station and the sun.”

What is that trail of green space-ghost mist? And those flaring beams of light that explode in the distance? Are those attack ships on fire off the shoulders of Orion? That’s my best bet.