What is being described as one of the first tomatoes ever harvested in space has finally been recovered after it went missing for eight months. NASA astronaut Frank Rubio was among an International Space Station (ISS) team that worked on VEG-05, an experiment to grow red robin tomatoes in the ISS’ Vegetable Production System (a.k.a. Veggie). After completing the 100-day planned duration, the tomatoes were harvested and studied for crop growth, nutrient composition, microbial food safety, flavor and more.
It was Rubio’s tomato that eventually went missing. Rubio recently made history for spending a record-setting 371 days in space. Following his return to Earth in late September, Rubio spoke at an October NASA briefing, where he shut down rumors claiming he had eaten his lost tomato.“I put [the tomato] in a little bag, and one of my crewmates was doing [an] event with some schoolkids, and I thought it'd be kind of cool to show the kids, ‘Hey guys, this is the first tomato harvested in space,’” he said. “Then, I was pretty confident that I Velcroed it where I was supposed to Velcro it, and then I came back and it was gone.”
Rubio continued, “Hopefully, somebody will find it someday, some little shriveled thing in a Ziploc bag, and they can prove the fact that I did not eat the tomato in space.”
That day has finally come for Rubio. During a NASA video talk from the ISS earlier this week, astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli said the tomato has indeed been found: “Our good friend Frank Rubio who headed home has been blamed for quite a while for eating the tomato — but we can exonerate him: We found the tomato.”
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