In 1961, the first person to be in space was named Yuri Gagarin. He was sent to space by a vostok rocket and orbited the earth 1 time, which took 1 hour  and 30 minutes before he safely got back home.There were many problems with that rocket, and overtime, rockets have evolved to last longer in space. As years went on, space technology started advancing by letting humans stay in space for months without it being their cause of death.

Recently, an astronaut named Frank Rubio broke the record for the longest time spent in space. He was in space for more than a year! 371 days to be precise! What’s funny is that he had no intention of breaking that record. The justification for him remaining in space longer was that his spacecraft had been severely damaged from a hit by a small space rock, and the spacecraft needed to be returned to Earth for repairs. The issue was that when a new spaceship arrived for him, it was empty. Their was no astronauts to execute the allotted work that was assigned to that spacecraft, so he had to stay an extra 6 months to complete it. Throughout the whole experience, he said it was incredible despite all the hard work he had to do, and the fact that he missed many important family events back on earth. He said he had a great time living in space and hanging out with 28 different astronauts from many different countries on the International Space Station. Welcome home Frank!

“Once you commit to the mission,” he said, “…the mission kind of counts on you.”

-Frank Rubio