Nasa astronaut Sunita Williams, these days onboard the World Territory Station (ISS), is making ready to vote in the United States presidential election era orbiting Earth, roughly 400 km above its floor.
Astronauts not able to achieve their polling stations can nonetheless take part in elections from length. Homogeneous to how family on Earth virtue absentee ballots, astronauts make the most of a gadget that mirrors this procedure to solid their vote.
Upcoming finishing a Federal Submit Card Software to request an absentee poll, an astronaut receives an digital model. This digital poll upcoming travels a important distance—1.2 million miles—from the length station to Project Keep watch over at Nasa’s Johnson Territory Middle in Texas.
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The poll’s walk is dependent upon the Monitoring and Knowledge Relay Satellite tv for pc Machine for accumulation transmission. From the length station, the encrypted poll travels to a take a look at facility in Unused Mexico ahead of attaining Johnson Territory Middle. In any case, the poll arrives at its ultimate vacation spot: the astronaut’s county clerk, who formally counts the vote.
This mode guarantees the astronaut’s vote rest secret, as most effective Williams and the county clerk have get admission to to the poll.
This isn’t the primary date an American astronaut has voted from length. Astronaut David Wolf was once the primary to vote from length in 1997, and maximum lately, astronaut Kate Rubins solid her vote from the ISS all the way through the 2020 US elections.
Astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore, these days orbiting Earth at the Boeing Starliner tablet, are anticipated to go back in February, then the election.
