Did you know that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) offers a whole series of soldering instructional videos that teach good soldering technique? Sure, they are aimed at high school students participating in the JOVE radio project, but they are freely available to everyone – even say a biomedical engineer about to take her first trip into space.

If Dr. Ryan Stone (played by Sandra Bullock) had watched the videos and brought along her Master Appliance soldering iron, things could have gone very differently in the award-winning space odyssey Gravity.

Here are three ways Sandra Bullock could have saved herself:

1. She could have used it to reattach her tether once it was initially severed by the space debris. Not only does the Ultratorch® UT-100Si repair vinyl, it is also cordless, self-heating, lightweight and comes with a protective cap; all features that are extremely handy in space.

2. She could have used it to burn through the tangled parachute lines holding Soyuz to the International Space Station (ISS). Her Master Appliance soldering iron also functions as a heat tool, which can be adjusted to temperatures up to 1200°F. That’s plenty hot to burn through some parachute cables, and may have gotten her out of there faster.

3. She could have prevented the whole tragedy by soldering astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) into his space suit. His tomfoolery in the opening moments is classic space film foreshadowing. No good can come from it. Surely a doctor capable enough to land a mission in space would have recognized the bad omen immediately. Using her Master Appliance soldering gun to disrupt his hijinks could have broken the curse, averted the crisis and saved lives.

For more information on how Master Appliance soldering guns can save you, please contact us!