How Astronauts Celebrates New Year? How Would They Know to Start?

How do the seven astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS) know when to yell "Happy New Year!" as 2023 approaches? Given that the ISS orbits the Earth at 17,500 mph and experiences several sunrises and sunsets during a single Earth day, you may assume that it would be simple for astronauts to become disoriented about the passage of time. Fortunately, this problem was thought of and a simple remedy was developed when astronauts began to reside on the orbital outpost more than two decades ago. NASA and its international partners chose to set clocks aboard the ISS to the Universal Time Clock (UTC), a time standard that correlates with the Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) zone in London, so that ISS residents would be able to appropriately arrange space-based operations and activities. [caption id="attachment_75989" align="alignright" width="1200"] Image: Nasa[/caption] It implies that on January 31, which is midnight UTC/GMT, a new year officially begins aboard the space station at 7 p.m. ET (4 p.m. PT). Of course, it's conceivable that each crew member will desire to observe the start of a new year in accordance with the time zone in which they now reside on Earth. The ISS crew currently consists of the Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata, the Americans Frank Rubio, Nicole Mann, and Josh Cassada, the Russians Sergey Prokopyev, Dmitri Petelin, and Anna Kikina, and the Americans Frank Rubio, Nicole Mann, and Josh Cassada. The astronauts will probably come together for a single New Year's celebration where they will partake of some special foods and think back on their time in space thus far. Alcohol is not permitted on the space station, so there won't be any champagne celebrations. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="2500"] Picture Credit: Newsweek[/caption] Would you like to learn more about the living and working conditions for astronauts on the International Space Station? You're covered by Digital Trends.