History of Apple Products That Went to Space | One More Thing

0:00 The iPhone is having a cool out of this world moment,

0:03 because the Artemis II mission astronauts use their iPhones

0:06 to take stunning photos on their trip around the moon.

0:10 And they're using the iPhone 17 Pro Max, the same phone I keep in my pocket.

0:15 This thing was in space,

0:16 getting way better shots of the moon than any of us ever will.

0:20 It's one of the first times NASA

0:21 allowed astronauts to fly with their personal smartphones.

0:25 But this is not the first time an iPhone has been to space.

0:29 In fact, many Apple products have been to space

0:31 and sometimes it proved to be a little dangerous.

0:33 Better watch where you eject that thing.

0:36 This is One More Thing, the show on all things Apple.

0:38 So let's look at all the Apple things that have

0:41 been to space and the challenges and missions they fulfilled.

0:44 It's not easy to get a gadget to space these days.

0:47 The Artemis II crew on board Orion

0:49 only used their iPhones for photos and videos.

0:53 There have been great moments of them capturing life in the cabin.

0:56 The iPhone is also a good selfie mirror when shaving, it seems.

1:01 But the iPhone is not for making calls.

1:03 There is no reception in space.

1:04 This is not for playing Hello Kitty Island Adventure.

1:07 No internet.

1:08 No Bluetooth shall be used.

1:10 This is an approved tool on a mission worth billions of dollars,

1:14 and as such, NASA had to put it through four phases of testing.

1:17 a New York Times story did lay out the steps.

1:20 First, it has to pass a safety panel.

1:22 Then folks have to go through all the potential hazards,

1:26 like how likely is it the glass could shatter,

1:30 and then you have shards of glass floating around.

1:33 Total nightmare stuff, right?

1:34 Not good in space.

1:36 Third step is to make a plan on what to do if the bad stuff happened.

1:41 And the fourth step is proving your plan could work.

1:43 In a social media post back in February,

1:47 NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said personal

1:50 phones were approved for capturing special moments.

1:53 That way, they can share inspiring images and video with the world.

1:57 The iPhone 17 Pro Max is a very new camera,

2:00 but it's not the only camera in the mission.

2:03 Some amazing shots, like what you see here,

2:06 were taken with Nikon’s current flagship dSLR camera, the mirrorless Z9.

2:12 But the primary camera now is Nikon D5.

2:16 That is a ten year old camera.

2:19 Why are we using old tech?

2:21 Well, because it has been rigorously tested to handle space and the model is

2:26 found to be reliable and sometimes just

2:28 better at capturing when light is really dim.

2:31 Some of the best shots of the trip came from the Nikon D5.

2:35 The crew also used various GoPro cameras,

2:37 and you can find the details of all the photos

2:40 taken and what equipment was used on NASA's Flickr page.

2:43 And even if it wasn't taken with an iPhone,

2:45 it sure can make for great iPhone wallpaper.

2:48 All that said, smartphones have flown in space before in other ways.

2:53 In 2021, an iPhone took this photo during the Inspiration 4 mission,

2:59 which was operated by SpaceX.

3:01 A decade earlier in 2011, IPhones were not personal devices.

3:07 Instead, they were part of an experiment on board the space shuttle Atlantis.

3:11 It was two iPhone 4S models that were on the final space shuttle mission,

3:15 and they were tested on the International Space Station.

3:18 The phones had an app to help conduct experiments using the iPhone's sensors,

3:23 and NASA wanted to learn how radiation affects the iPhone.

3:26 But the first iPhone in space did not need to hitch a ride on a rocket.

3:30 In 2010, a father and son from New

3:33 York attached an iPhone 4 to a weather balloon,

3:36 and it went 19 miles up into the stratosphere

3:39 before the balloon popped and it parachuted down.

3:42 It was found with the iPhone's GPS.

3:45 But what about other Apple devices?

3:47 Well, iPads and other tablets have been used on the International Space Station.

3:52 It is a great way to pull up info for a manual,

3:55 and it's faster than flipping through papers.

3:59 And astronauts need music, right?

4:01 So naturally, iPods were on the ISS.

4:04 It was just for personal enjoyment.

4:06 Credit to Apple Insider for pulling together some great old

4:09 post of moments that iPods were spotted in NASA photos,

4:12 such as back in 2006 on space shuttle Discovery.

4:16 And these seem to be attached to an external battery pack for power.

4:21 AirPods are being used to listen to music right

4:23 now in orbit around the Earth on the ISS.

4:26 NASA astronaut Jessica Meir has this workout video she

4:30 shared while she wore AirPods to record the video.

4:33 The workout area is loud, with equipment and fan and vent systems all running,

4:38 but AirPods and their active noise canceling can help block that out.

4:42 The Apple Watch has been spotted being worn by astronauts on the ISS.

4:47 And on SpaceX Mission Inspiration 4, the Apple Watch was part of health research

4:54 to see how space was affecting astronauts' bodies.

4:57 Even the Mac made it to space the Macintosh Portable Computer.

5:01 It was part of an experiment in 1990 to find a better

5:05 way to use different cursor inputs on a computer in space,

5:08 because a mouse just doesn't work all that great without gravity.

5:12 It turns out the trackball wasn't all that great either.

5:16 And there were some other things discovered about computing in space.

5:19 When we get rid of these disks,

5:21 you're going to have to pay attention to where they go.

5:23 A year later, in 1991, the Macintosh Portable made the trip again.

5:27 It was used to send the first e-mail from space.

5:31 NASA ended up going with ThinkPads for future space shuttle missions.

5:36 But it is a bit of fun history to look at Apple's role in space exploration.

5:40 And even in the Artemis II mission, we of course see other tech that's there.

5:45 For example, Microsoft had its moments, but I mean, not in the best of ways.

5:49 There was an outlook glitch.

5:50 The crew was unable to log into outlook,

5:53 and we saw it happen on a Microsoft Surface Pro.

5:56 You know, that isn't as fun, of course,

5:58 as talking about iPhone selfies in space.

6:00 And it's only fitting that selfie cameras

6:03 are here today because the work of NASA.

6:07 Rocket scientists developed the technology that led

6:09 to the first cell phone cameras.

6:11 NASA invents the tiny cameras used in iPhones,

6:14 and then iPhones are used by NASA.

6:17 You love it when things come all the way around like that.

6:20 Thanks for watching.

6:21 And if you're wondering what Apple device may make

6:23 it to space in the next Artemis III mission, well, that's not until 2027.

6:28 Maybe by then we're testing folding iPhones in Zero-G.

6:32 We'll have to see what comes this year, won't we?

6:34 But I'll catch you, as usual on Earth next week when

6:37 there's one more thing to talk about in the world of Apple.