FAQs
During the Apollo moon landings, the astronauts described the scent as gunpowder-like, while those who went to the international space station (ISS) compared it to burnt steak.
What does the space smell like? ›
Another NASA astronaut, Don Pettit, described the smell of space at length in a NASA blog post, saying, "The best description I can come up with is metallic; a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation.
What does the galaxy smell like? ›
In fact, we can even recreate the smell of the heart of the galaxy—astronomers searching for animo acids in Sagittarius B2, a vast dust cloud in the middle of the Milky Way, have reported that due to a substance called ethyl formate, it smells and tastes of raspberries and rum—much more pleasant than seared steak and ...
Why does space smell like gunpowder? ›
Since there's no chemical similarity between moondust and gunpowder, the smell could have been the dust reacting with oxygen and/or water inside the lander, or due to the release of charged particles from the Sun that had become trapped in the dust.
What does the space station smell like? ›
UK astronaut Tim Peake said the ISS smell is “like a barbecue that's gone wrong”, while Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti mentioned a “peculiar odour” she had to adjust to while working on board the Space Station. Tim Peake has also spoken about what space smells like, describing it as "like static electricity".
What does Mars smell like? ›
The atmosphere on Mars is mostly carbon dioxide. However, the dirt is primarily iron oxide, which gives its ochre tint, much like central Australia. The atmosphere also has sulfur and acids. This means Mars would most likely have a desert-like acid smell, with some interesting overtones.
What does Venus smell like? ›
Venus' sulfuric acid clouds smell like rotten eggs.
What would planets smell like? ›
Mercury has a very sparse atmosphere and so would not have much of a smell at all. Venus and Mars, much like Uranus, have substantial quantities of eggy hydrogen sulphide. For Jupiter, the smell would depend on where you were in the atmosphere.
What would the ocean smell like? ›
For many, the scent of the sea is one of hot sand mixed with sunscreen and maybe even coconut, and is therefore a sweet, enveloping and warm smell. For others, it's that unmistakable mix of salt, seaweed and iodine, a scent that remains on our clothes after a day spent at the beach even in the middle of winter.
Does the universe have a flavor? ›
In 2009, astronomers were able to identify a chemical called ethyl formate in a big dust cloud at the center of the Milky Way. Ethyl formate happens to be responsible for the flavor of raspberries (it also smells like rum). Space tastes like raspberries!
After walking on the Moon astronauts hopped back into their lunar lander, bringing Moon dust with them. They were surprised, and perplexed, to find that it smelled like spent gunpowder.
What does the sun smell like? ›
You can't smell the sun or maybe you can, if you think that everything around you has an odor and in most cases that smell originates from the sun. Some years ago astronomers stated that the center of our galaxy actually would smell of rum.
What does space taste like? ›
The molecule is known to smell like rum and taste like raspberries. Since rum and raspberries are familiar to most people, “we had something that was a real standard of identity with ethyl formate,” Ramirez says. The foreign nature of space opened up room for interpretation.
What does space smell like bacon? ›
In fact, most interstellar carbon is locked up in PAHs. They're also plentiful in the solar system, so they can be picked easily up by astronauts and brought inside the space station or a space capsule — and they're probably the source of the burnt-meat smell that astronauts report.
What does space dust smell like? ›
Other astronauts have described it in similar yet varying ways: "burning metal," "a distinct odor of ozone, an acrid smell," "walnuts and brake pads," "gunpowder" and even "burnt almond cookie." Much like all wine connoisseurs smell something a bit different in the bottle, astronaut reports differ slightly in their " ...
Does space smell like burnt toast? ›
This would explain the sour, metallic smell. So what about the other odors? There's probably something else going on. Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), found in charred food like burnt toast and barbecued meat, also occur routinely in space.
How does earth smell like? ›
Geosmin is the pleasant smell of soil and that earthy scent that comes with and after rain. It is one of the chemicals that makes the smell of petrichor. Out of the petrichor chemicals, I choose to highlight geosmin, though, because microbes produce it.
Is it cold in space? ›
Space is very, very cold. The baseline temperature of outer space is 2.7 kelvins — minus 454.81 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 270.45 degrees Celsius — meaning it is barely above absolute zero, the point at which molecular motion stops. But this temperature is not constant throughout the solar system.
Does space have a sound? ›
Space is a vacuum
Sound is carried by atoms and molecules. In space, with no atoms or molecules to carry a sound wave, there's no sound. There's nothing to get in sound's way out in space, but there's nothing to carry it, so it doesn't travel at all. No sound also means no echo.
