00:09:03 · Shubhanshu Shukla
[00:09:03] S0: Quickly, I would say when we started the selection, we did not know, you know, what to look for. We had never done this before. So we the doctors and the entire medical team, we started searching for potential candidates out of the test pilot. So, had total 72 test pilots in India and already we knew getting into the test pilot is also a selection. Like you apply, you appear for an exam, you fly and then you get selected and then you do the course. So, there was one level of selection already there, but when we reached there, we didn't know what to look for. So, we took help from the Russians, their team came, looked at the records that we had. We went to Russia twice for getting evaluated there. One of the criteria for you to be an astronaut that you really have to have good teeth. You know, that is what I didn't know. Good teeth. We had good teeth, yes, We didn't know. And the reason is, I'll talk about the other tangible things later, but the reason is that you get trained medically also. When you go up there, you are trained as a medical professional, because if something happens, you have to take care there. There is no help that is going to be available. But you cannot do a dental surgery in space. There is no way to do it. So, you remove all the possibility of having any issues with your teeth while you are up there, because this will be a mission call off criteria, if something happens, because the pain is, it is gritting and then it's just so, it has been historically the case. So, most of our rejections actually happened on teeth, in dental health, initially, which is something what we learned. So, this is what we didn't know. So, you didn't prepare for it. The good part is that there is no condition for your dentals which makes you permanently unpaired. So, everything can be taken care of, but it takes time. So, you need to know for it in advance. So, that was one thing. The other part of the question that you said, what are the common traits? So, it's a bucket system. You have three buckets that you have to fit in, you have to be physically It is demanding physically, so you have to have the ability to sustain whatever you are going to be exposed to. You have to be medically fit. Not all of you will have a lot of control over that.
00:11:12 · Shubhanshu Shukla, Aditya Agarwal
Some things are going to be genetically disposed and you will have what you have, but there are a lot of parameters that are checked. And actually, was really surprised that these many tests exist. You know, I have not given blood in millilitres, I have given blood in litres, you know, for the medical test. You have that kind of... [00:11:31] S1: What is the hardest physical challenge that you had to prove? Like, is there some version of the yo yo test? Do have to like... I'm assuming this cardio, this strength. What is the hardest one? [00:11:39] S0: So, we didn't have any benchmark. So we went to the Russian site and we looked at what they do, and so we we followed what they do. So I think being in the Air Force, a lot of it was possible. We had to train for it. So, I will give you a big example. So, we had to run a five ks in under twenty four minutes. We had to do about 11 pull ups and then 30 push ups. The hardest I found was, because I am not a very good swimmer, was swimming. You know, we had to do 800 meter swimings in under twenty minutes. So that was something that I found challenging. Know, we had to really train for... [00:12:14] S1: Okay, so far I can be an astronaut, I can do all that. Okay. [00:12:16] S0: Yes, great. What about the teeth? [00:12:19] S1: You know, it's funny. When you were saying that, I was like, now I'm definitely gonna get my 10 year old to brush every night. So...
00:12:19 · Aditya Agarwal, Shubhanshu Shukla
[00:12:19] S1: You know, it's funny. When you were saying that, I was like, now I'm definitely gonna get my 10 year old to brush every night. So... [00:12:29] S0: But even more important is, you know, even if you're not in a good physical shape today, you can be. These are all achievable, all achievable. It is not something that is out of your reach. Medically, it is what it is. But probably the most important of it is the psychological makeup or the psychological fitness. Again, there was extensive tests that I did, I don't know, because these days are very random, you don't know what are they checking for. But you undergo a lot of evaluation in various situations for the psychological fitness. And again, the last one was you are put into isolation for seven days. For the psych... Psychological fitness, is that something that is... [00:13:09] S1: Is that an adaptable trait?
00:13:09 · Aditya Agarwal, Shubhanshu Shukla
[00:13:09] S1: Is that an adaptable trait? [00:13:11] S0: Oh, absolutely. You can train. It is. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. You you can train for that. You change as a person every day based on what experiences you have, and you should be open to learn from it, that's all. And so if you expose yourself, like you said, if you expose yourself to doing hard things every day, you will be okay with it, well, no, few months down the line. It will be okay for you, you will not think twice. So, it is skill that can be learned, it is a skill that you can train for. But it is a very important skill and especially after going for my mission, I realised that it is very crucial. Your ability to deal with unknown situations, difficult situations, has to be really high. You should be okay with a lot of things when you are going up there, because there are going to be a lot of unknowns which are going to throw themselves at you. You will not know. Things will go wrong. And when something goes wrong and you're not in the right mood, anything that your colleague does feels irritating. And so, you have to be really, really strong. I resilience think is a very, very important part. [00:14:12] S1: Shubhanshu, you need to design a psychological test for SPC membership. Okay. Alright. But what is the last one? The isolation? That's really interesting.
00:14:12 · Aditya Agarwal, Shubhanshu Shukla
[00:14:12] S1: Shubhanshu, you need to design a psychological test for SPC membership. Okay. Alright. But what is the last one? The isolation? That's really interesting. [00:14:21] S0: So you said physically, I told you hard. But I think out of all the tests, I think the isolation was the hardest one for me because they put you in isolation, we were three of us, we go inside, it's the platform that we have, this was the platform for isolation. There were three beds bunked up on-site and that was the only space. No artificial light, you know... Sorry, no natural light. You know, there was no connection with the outside world. There was no clock. There was no way to tell what is the time. [00:14:44] S1: No [00:14:45] S0: clock? No clock. And so you were there for seven days and you had to just feel. [00:14:50] S1: You have your iPhone or not? Sorry? No phones. Of course, no phones. No phones. Alright. Now you're screwed. Okay. Yes. [00:14:59] S0: So that was really challenging. And and, obviously, it is designed to put stress on you, so you... They will make you do mundane things, you know, which takes time, like origami, you know, or making... An origami not just making one swan, but making thousand swans, you know, out of paper sitting in extended period of time. So they really test you to the, you know, limit, and how do you react to those situations. So that was probably the hardest, I would say.
00:14:59 · Shubhanshu Shukla, Aditya Agarwal
[00:14:59] S0: So that was really challenging. And and, obviously, it is designed to put stress on you, so you... They will make you do mundane things, you know, which takes time, like origami, you know, or making... An origami not just making one swan, but making thousand swans, you know, out of paper sitting in extended period of time. So they really test you to the, you know, limit, and how do you react to those situations. So that was probably the hardest, I would say. [00:15:21] S1: So maybe switching from getting ready for going to space to actually going to space. You know, you often hear astronauts talking about what a deeply emotional experience it is to look at the Earth and all of us contained within it, kind of from the outside in. How did it... What is the experience like for you?