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'Different Planet': US Astronaut Shares Her Feelings After Returning to COVID-19 Hit Earth

While the astronaut did not refer to the COVID-19 crisis specifically in her online message sent after returning planetside, some netizens were quick to note that for a person who stayed in a space station for so long, enduring the coronavirus lockdown should be easy.
Sputnik

NASA astronaut and ISS expedition crew member Jessica Meir, who has recently returned to Earth, has apparently offered a brief assessment of the current situation in the world on Twitter.

The Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft carrying Meir and her colleagues, another NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan and Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka, landed in Kazakhstan on 17 April.

"We’ve returned to a different planet, but it remains a spectacular one", Meir tweeted, possibly referring to the current crisis, though she didn't elaborate – at least in that particular post.

But while Jessica's tweet didn't mention the coronavirus pandemic specifically, several social media users were quick to bring up the topic while replying to her message, with some joking about lockdown being a "piece of cake" for a person who stayed in the closed confines of a space station for so long.

As lengthy spaceflights apparently tend to weaken a person's immune system, the staff tending to the returned spacefarers was wearing face masks and gloves; and rather than being taken to the nearby city of Karaganda for a welcoming ceremony, the now former ISS crew was flown directly to Baikonur – all due to the coronavirus precautions, it seems.

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