Here on earth, we tend to take showers for granted, but for astronauts stationed in space, taking a quick rinse — much like cooking, eating, using the toilet, and just about every other mundane task — becomes a lot more complicated due to the near-absence of gravity. On earth, gravity keeps our pans on the stove, food on our plates, and water falling from the shower headed in a straight, uninterrupted line. In space, water not only floats around like dust but also sticks to itself due to surface tension, forming bubbly spheres that are every bit as mesmerizing to watch as they are ill-suited for washing. Crew members on NASA’s Gemini and Apollo missions — which took place during the 1960s — opted for sponge baths, cleaning themselves with soap and wash cloths just as one would on earth, only a bit more laboriously. Skylab — the first U.S. space station — came equipped with a contraption more closely resembling a shower. A floor-to-ceiling, cylinder-shaped tarp acted as a shower curtain to prevent water from escaping, and a nitrogen-pressurized water bottle functioned as a shower head, substituting propelling force for gravity. Skylab’s successor, the International Space Station, ended up reverting back to sponge baths, with astronauts cleaning themselves using rinse-free soap and shampoo. Unfortunately, no matter how thoroughly astronauts clean themselves, the ISS’s facilities are unable to rival the efficiency of bathrooms down on earth.
