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Shubhanshu Shukla recalls weightless life on ISS: 'Floating is just falling forever'
“Believe it or not - Everything you see in this frame is falling,” Shukla wrote, explaining the strange science behind the phenomenon.
Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, India’s first astronaut to visit the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the Axiom-4 mission, has offered a vivid glimpse into the surreal experience of life in orbit. In a post on X, Shukla shared a video of himself changing a camera lens aboard the ISS, only to realise that the equipment refused to drop as it would on Earth. “Believe it or not - Everything you see in this frame is falling,” Shukla wrote, explaining the strange science behind the phenomenon.
Shukla recalled that, during his first days aboard the station, he felt hesitant to release objects. “In space, my early instinct was to politely hand over items to crew-mates instead of just releasing them,” he said. According to him, even veteran astronauts were just as cautious at first, joking that the team would pass tools around “like an overly careful game of hot potato.”
“Here’s the catch: nothing actually falls away in orbit. As you see in this video if I let go of the lens, it doesn’t drop—it hovers. Why? Because both the lens and I are falling at the same speed around Earth. No relative falling = no ‘down’,” he explained.
Shukla traced the idea back to Isaac Newton’s thought experiment of throwing a ball from a mountain so fast that it circles the Earth. “That’s exactly what orbit is,” Shukla said. “It’s falling forever, but never hitting the ground.”
“That’s what orbit really is: perpetual free fall,” he said.
Shukla also stressed that astronauts aren’t free of gravity. “Gravity up here is still about 90% as strong as at Earth’s surface. We feel weightless because we and everything around us are constantly falling together,” he wrote, adding, “Floating in space is really just falling—forever.”
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How did social media react?
Social media users praised Shukla for providing fascinating insights into space travel.
“Mind-blowing! Floating in space isn’t magic it’s perpetual free fall. Everything around you “falls together,” which is why astronauts seem weightless. Newton would be proud!” one user wrote.
“Wow, this is amazing! Floating = falling forever… seeing the lens float like was absolutely thrilling! You’ve made India proud and inspired the next generation!” commented another.
“Understanding that orbit is simply perpetual free-fall turns space from a science fact into pure magic—Newton would be thrilled!” wrote a third user.
