Earth and Space

Time to Sleep!

On Earth, we need to go to sleep every night to rest our bodies and gain energy for a new day. Getting a good night’s sleep is essential to our health and well being. On Earth, most people sleep in a bed that is soft and comfortable.

In space, it is still necessary for astronauts to go to sleep every night in order to rest their bodies and stay healthy. Most astronauts even sleep about the same amount of time in space as they do on Earth. But because of microgravity, the way astronauts sleep is very different from the way we sleep on Earth.

There is nothing weighing down the astronauts’ bodies in space because there is very little gravity. That’s why astronauts have to strap themselves into special sleeping bags that hang from the wall! The sleeping bags have straps that press astronauts to a soft surface and to a pillow. Yet, most astronauts actually like to sleep floating in the air, with only a couple of straps to keep them from bouncing around the cabin. In addition to special sleeping bags, astronauts may need to wear blindfolds to protect them from the strong sunlight that streams in the windows during orbit in space.

In her journal, Joan Higginbotham explains how sleeping in space is different from sleeping at home on Earth.

From the Journal of Joan Higginbotham

“Everyone thinks that it must be difficult to sleep in space because they imagine there to be a lot of noise. There is a lot of noise on the shuttle, but not so much that it makes it uncomfortable to sleep. You can hear the fans whirling—the cabin fans that actually help clean the air. I actually sleep without earplugs. Some of my crewmates did use earplugs. But it wasn’t noisy enough that it disturbed their sleep.”