Astronauts have been voting from the Worldwide Space Station since 1997 and have strong ballots in every U.S. presidential election since 2004, in addition to one.
NASA makes use of digital encryption to protect astronauts’ votes as they’re despatched once more to Mission Administration in Houston. Credit score rating: NASA
Astronauts aboard the Worldwide Space Station (ISS) orbit the Earth a complete lot of miles above American soil. Nevertheless that doesn’t indicate they’ll’t vote whereas they float.
Definitely, Boeing Starliner astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams—who’ve been throughout the orbital laboratory since June after their check out mission was extended on account of safety points—said they intend to strong their ballots throughout the November U.S. presidential election from orbit. They are not the first to take motion—they normally possibly shouldn’t be going to be the ultimate.
NASA astronaut David Wolf, aboard the now-defunct Mir Space Station, was the first American to strong a ballot from the last word frontier. Wolf voted in Houston’s native elections after the Texas Legislature, which oversees NASA’s Johnson Space Coronary heart, handed a bill permitting digital voting in space.
Since 2004, ISS occupants have voted in all nonetheless one presidential election: 2012, when Williams and crewmate Kevin Ford submitted absentee ballots sooner than launching to the orbital laboratory. Most not too way back, ISS astronaut Kate Rubins voted throughout the 2020 race. Astronauts dwelling open air Texas, within the meantime, have strong ballots by coordinating with their native voter corporations division.
“It’s a significant obligation that we have got as residents, and [I am] wanting forward to with the power to vote from space, which is pretty cool,” Williams knowledgeable reporters all through a NASA press conference in September.
So, how do they do it? The strategy is unquestionably pretty simple.
Like completely different info beamed between the ISS and NASA mission administration in Houston, the astronauts’ votes are despatched via the corporate’s Near Space Neighborhood, which handles communications in low-Earth orbit.
After making use of for an absentee ballot, astronauts fill it out electronically aboard the realm station. NASA then encrypts and uploads the knowledge into an onboard laptop computer, which feeds it via the corporate’s Monitoring and Info Relay Satellite tv for pc television for laptop System (TDRSS). Solely the astronaut and their county clerk’s office can view the picks.
The TDRSS beams ballots to a terminal at NASA’s White Sands Check out Facility in New Mexico. From there, landlines transmit them to Mission Administration in Houston, the place they’re despatched electronically to the county clerk’s office for submitting.
“Astronauts forego a number of the comforts afforded to those once more on Earth as they embark on their journeys to space for the benefit of humanity,” NASA said in a weblog put up earlier this month. “Though they’re faraway from home, NASA’s networks be part of them with their household and buddies and offers them the prospect to participate in democracy and society whereas in orbit.”
In March, NASA astronauts Loral O’Hara and Jasmin Moghbeli, part of the ISS Expedition 70 crew, voted from the orbital laboratory as Texas residents. Accompanying Wilmore and Williams on the ISS are the crews of the Soyuz MS-26 and SpaceX Crew-9 missions, along with two People who’re moreover eligible to strong ballots from space.
Editor’s phrase: This textual content initially appeared on FLYING.