In the first edition of the Scout handbook published in 1911, there’s a chapter called “Knots Every Scout Should Know.”
“Every day, sailors, explorers, mechanics and mountain climbers risk their lives on the knots that they tie,” it reads. “Thousands of lives have been sacrificed to ill-made knots. The Scout therefore should be prepared in an emergency, or when necessity demands, to tie the right knot in the right way.”
Nearly 115 years later and it still holds true, both here on Earth and in outer space.
Sharon Hagle, a STEM education advocate and astronaut with two Blue Origin flights under her belt, was recently tasked with a simple assignment that turned out to be not so simple: to tie a knot in space.
The experiment was done in collaboration with Space Games Federation, the first sanctioning and governing body for sports in space.
“The purpose was to try tying a knot in zero gravity that could be used to secure a payload,” Hagle says. “It’s much easier to do that on Earth where you have gravity.”
The task fit in with the message Hagle tries to spread when she speaks to schoolchildren about opportunities in space: If there’s a task that is useful on Earth now, someday it will be useful in space too.
“Kids think the only job in the space industry is an astronaut,” she says. “What we need here, we need there. There’s room in space for welders, mechanics, fashion designers, farmers, physicians … space is for everyone.”
Be Prepared for more careers in space
As Hagle and her husband, Marc, prepared for their second spaceflight, they wanted to be more than tourists having a good time.
“We want to make these suborbital flights more beneficial for the benefit of Earth with the goal of getting more humans into space in the future,” she says.
Houston’s Translational Research Institute for Space Health asked her to wear a “bio button” — a medical device that tracks vital signs and the body’s responses to the pressure (both physically and mentally) of spaceflight.
And she had to tie a knot.
She wouldn’t have much time. Mission NS-28 used the New Shepard rocket to travel about 66 miles above the Earth’s surface. The flight lasted a little more than 11 minutes, only four of which were spent in zero gravity.
And that doesn’t account for the time it takes to unbuckle your seat belt in just the right way so you don’t inadvertently launch yourself across the cabin.
A worthy cause
Hagle founded SpaceKids Global in 2015. Like many aspects of the Scouting program, its mission is to inspire elementary students in STEAM education: science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics, with an emphasis on ensuring that girls are equally represented.
“We want to make kids participators, not spectators,” she says. “We want to make learning fun again. We bring hands-on immersive experiences to elementary students across the country.”
Like another astronaut we featured on this blog, Hagle says looking down upon Earth from space completely changes your perspective on our planet. If anything, it’s made her even more dedicated to gathering data and making space more accessible for future generations.
A properly tied knot will hold just as well in space as it does on the ground. Knots have been used to secure payloads for many space missions over the years.
What NASA wanted to know was more about the process of tying a knot in zero gravity. As more and more people spend more and more time on the International Space Station – and eventually beyond – knot tying on the fly will become more and more crucial.
The result of Hagle’s experiment? She got the knot tied but struggled at first dealing with the lack of tension on each end of the rope.
“It’s tricky when the ends of the rope are actually floating around you,” she says. “You’re trying to maneuver your hands and put tension on the rope.
“The secret of tying a knot in space is to put tension on the rope then tie the knot.”
Blue Origin’s Club for the Future program is a proud partner of Scouting America. Click here to learn more.
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