Perhaps we’re too distraught about the ways shipping noise affects whales, airplanes intrude on hikers’ solitude, or wind turbines disturb sleep of nearby neighbors.  Wouldn’t it be nice to settle into the peacefully silent world of the International Space Station?  Well, maybe not.  Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield has been following in the grand Canadian tradition of exploring the acoustic ecology of his home place, and the results are not at all like the stillness of the 2001 spaceship, nor the calm-broken-only-by-sudden-alien-encounters of the Starship Enterprise.  Though he does highly recommend the Japanese Experiment Module as a place to get away from the cacophony that a CNET article calls “more like a noisy tin can.”

Here’s a taste of his recordings; see the CNET link above, or this Soundcloud page, for many more.