When Commander Scott Kelly’s Soyuz capsule touches down on the steppes of Kazakstan around 11:30 p.m. EST on March 1, he will officially become the first American to have spent almost an entire year in space. A year may not seem like that long, but think about it this way: When Kelly left the planet in March 2015, David Bowie was working on his final album and Star Wars: The Force Awakens wasn’t finished. Donald Trump was just a washed-up reality TV personality with a bad comb-over.
Kelly’s year in space is, in part, to research the effects of long-term exposure to microgravity conditions in preparation for future NASA missions to places like Mars. However, unlike the future expeditions his work's designed to help, Kelly has spent his year on the celestial porch—orbiting the planet aboard the International Space Station. Given his proximity to Earth, the 52-year old has been able to to share his story in real-time, using social media to chronicle sights and experiences from the marvelous to the mundane—well, if there were anything mundane about being in space.
Here, we present Commander Kelly’s year in space, as captured through his lens and described through his words. All the quotes are his, taken from Twitter or Instagram; we only added details where we thought clarification would be helpful. Otherwise, you’re seeing our pale blue dot the way he did.
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