This is one of the best-ever views of Earth from space
It's a view that very few people will ever get to see firsthand: Legs dangling in free fall above the Earth with nothing but empty space between you and the planet's blue surface 250 miles below.
If you're an astronaut on a spacewalk, however, this vertigo-inducing perspective is something you'll need to get used to, and fast.
NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough shared his unique perspective with people on social media after he ventured outside the International Space Station for a spacewalk on March 24.
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Spacewalking, which involves donning a bulky spacesuit to leave the relative safety of the Space Station, is one of the more dangerous activities an astronaut can take part in while in orbit.
Astronauts use tethers to move around outside of the laboratory, and even simple tasks, like using a wrench or removing and replacing experiments, can be strenuous in the extreme environment. Even moving your hands in the bulky gloves attached to a spacesuit can be difficult.
That said, NASA mission controllers monitor the astronauts the entire time they're moving around outside the station, giving them instructions and helping them through difficult tasks as needed.
Kimbrough stepped outside for his walk with European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet in order to perform some maintenance on the orbiting outpost. The two astronauts were outside for about 6.5 hours in total.
This is only the start of a series of spacewalks planned for the Space Station in the next week.
Kimbrough and NASA's Peggy Whitson will also head out into the vacuum of space for another spacewalk on March 30. And on April 6, Whitson and Pesquet will leave the airlock for the last spacewalk in the series.
Miriam Kramer worked as a staff writer for Space.com for about 2.5 years before joining Mashable to cover all things outer space. She took a ride in weightlessness on a zero-gravity flight and watched rockets launch to space from places around the United States. Miriam received her Master's degree in science, health and environmental reporting from New York University in 2012, and she originally hails from Knoxville, Tennessee. Follow Miriam on Twitter at @mirikramer.
