This French wine is truly out of this world.
The SpaceX capsule will bring a box of Bordeaux back to Earth when it splashes down Wednesday – and it’s not wine after more than a year of aging in space.
The intoxicating cargo was shipped to the International Space Station in November 2019 as part of an experiment launched by a Luxembourg-based start-up.
“Our goal is to address the solution of how tomorrow we will have an agriculture that is both organic and healthy and can feed humanity,” said Space Cargo Unlimited co-founder Nicolas Gaume.
“And we think space was key,” he said.
Plus, Gaume added, future lunar or Mars explorers might want a bit of Cabernet Sauvignon with their space rations.
“As a Frenchman, it’s part of life to eat and drink well,” he explained.
The 12 bottles are corked and carefully packed in steel cylinders to prevent breakage.
They are part of a larger payload that contains 320 Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon vine fragments sent into space in March and several mice.
The bottled wine will remain sealed until at least next month, when one or two are opened for a tasting in Bordeaux – followed by months of chemical testing to determine the impact of the space on the expensive grape juice.
The SpaceX Dragon capsule will splash down Wednesday night.
With pole wires