Unleash the Kraken: Check Out NASA’s ‘Disorientation Device’ From Hell
Key Highlights :
The U.S. Navy is unleashing its monstrous Kraken device on NASA, allowing the space agency to use the dizzying machine for an upcoming study that could help it mitigate the effects of spaceflight on astronauts. The Kraken is a 15.24 m-long machine that can spin like a washing machine, creating accelerations of up to three times the force of gravity to simulate what astronauts experience during spaceflight.
NASA has enlisted 24 active duty service members to ride the machine for 60 minutes in order to study ways to reduce the symptoms of motion sickness astronauts can experience during spaceflight. These symptoms include dizziness, nausea, and vertigo.
NASA astronaut Douglas Wheelock has experienced the disorientation of spaceflight first-hand. “Shortly after liftoff in the space shuttle, I felt like I was on a merry-go-round as my body hunted for what was up, down, left, and right,” he said in a NASA statement.
The Kraken can simulate different types of flight “to disorient occupants through sudden shifts in roll, pitch, and yaw, superimposed onto horizontal and vertical lurches,” NASA wrote. The machine will be set to a spaceflight-specific setting, as opposed to settings meant for jet pilots, allowing NASA scientists to study whether certain head movements could help ease astronauts’ motion sickness after their flight.
After the 24 volunteers exit the Kraken, 12 of them will perform prescribed head turns and tilts while wearing video goggles to track their head and eye movements. The goggles measure how much the participants blink, as well as changes to their heart rate, and other indications of their motion sickness. The volunteers will also answer questions about how they are feeling.
The other half of the group will not perform the head movements, but all 24 volunteers will be asked to perform four tasks: testing their balance while standing on foam with eyes open and closed, walking for 10 metres to test their speed, testing their endurance on another two-minute walk, and how long it takes for them to finish a standing and walking test that includes stepping over an obstacle.
Michael Schubert, a neurophysiologist at Johns Hopkins University and lead author of the study, said that “Anecdotes from astronauts suggest that performing slight head movements helps them recover a sense of balance more quickly. Tests with the Kraken will allow us to rigorously determine what head movements, if any, help astronauts to quickly recover their sense of balance.”
The U.S. Navy's monstrous Kraken device is allowing NASA to study ways to reduce the effects of spaceflight on astronauts. The 15.24 m-long machine can spin like a washing machine, creating accelerations of up to three times the force of gravity to simulate what astronauts experience during spaceflight. 24 active duty service members will ride the machine for 60 minutes to help scientists come up with ways to reduce symptoms such as dizziness, nausea, and vertigo. After the volunteers exit the Kraken, 12 of them will perform prescribed head turns and tilts while wearing video goggles to track their head and eye movements. The other half of the group will not perform the head movements, but all 24 volunteers will be asked to perform four tasks to test their balance, speed, endurance, and agility. The study is meant to determine whether certain head movements could help ease astronauts’ motion sickness after their flight. The results of the study could help astronauts adjust more quickly to the disorientation of spaceflight and reduce the symptoms of motion sickness.
