NASA astronaut Frank Rubio is truly incredible. In September 2023, he completed the longest single space flight for an American astronaut. And while he was no doubt glad to be back on solid ground, there was one thing that has been plaguing him for months, even before he got back to Earth: a tomato he grew in space had gone missing.
There was a lot of discussion around the missing tomato.
Growing a tomato in space is no mean feat, so the small round piece of produce was a hot commodity. When it suddenly went missing, people couldn’t stop talking about it.
Some people assumed Rubio must have eaten it himself, which wouldn’t have been very good since the tomato was a form of research to see if astronauts could somehow get access to fresh produce while in space.
“A proud moment of harvesting the first tomato in space became a self-inflicted wound of losing the first tomato in space,” Rubio told NASA in October.
After eight months, the tomato was finally found.
Koichi Wakata/Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, via NASA
On Wednesday, December 6, the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston had an interview with astronauts that are currently at the International Space Station, and they confirmed that the missing tomato had been located.
“Our good friend Frank Rubio, who headed home, has been blamed for quite a while for eating the tomato, but we can exonerate him,” said Maj. Jasmin Moghbeli. “We found the tomato.”
So, where was this tomato, anyway?
Sadly, Major Moghbeli didn’t say where the tomato had been found on board. They also didn’t share what it was like when they found it — had it rotted? Was it squashed? What did they do with it?
Given that the ISS is 356 feet long with two bathrooms, a gym, and six sleeping areas, there are plenty of places the tomato could have gotten to, though how is yet another unanswered question.
At least Frank Rubio can breathe a sigh of relief finally. He said that he’d put it in a bag to show students who were going to have a call with the astronauts.
“I was pretty confident that I Velcroed it where I was supposed to Velcro it, and then I came back and it was gone,” he said in October. He estimated that he searched for up to 20 hours to find the missing tomato, but to no avail.
