Why Astronauts Don’t Drink Wine in Space

In the early '70s, NASA revamped their array of space food to get ready for astronauts spending more time in space. Wine was added to the menu for the Skylab space station, and an American sherry was chosen for its stability.

The winner of the space Sherry taste test was Paul Masson California Rare Cream Sherry. A quantity of this Rare Cream Sherry was ordered for the entire Skylab mission and was delivered to the Johnson Space Center. A package was developed that consisted of a flexible plastic pouch with a built-in drinking tube, which could be cut off. The astronaut would simply squeeze the bag and drink the wine from the package. The flexible container was designed to be fitted into the Skylab pudding can.

But the sherry never went into space, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was the reaction from the always-prudish American public. To this day, American astronauts do not take alcoholic beverages into space. It’s a different story for cosmonauts, however- they get cognac, as you see in the picture above. Read the story of space sherry at Gizmodo. -via Digg

(Image credit: NASA/Jerry Linenger)


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