Space repairs and tubes to keep astronauts from choking
Last week, there was a minor technical problem on the International Space Station (ISS): the air conditioning went down. Ground experts tried to restart the cooling system, but this was unsuccessful. Work aboard the station stalled as less critical equipment was shut down to maintain a life-support atmosphere for the crew..
Fortunately, the ISS has a spare cooling unit. The two crew members simply had to go outside the station and plug in the device for everything to return to top-notch form. There is only one problem — you can drown in a spacesuit..
This has happened before. Back in July, an Italian astronaut nearly died when excess water started leaking into his helmet. In fact, when you are floating in the void of space, any amount of water can be too much. And NASA armed suits with a tube that pumps out excess fluids..
Since the main cause of the suit’s water leak during the July incident is still not known, the pipes are temporary insurance. Two Americans will begin repairing the cooling system using these tubes. By the way, four Russian cosmonauts went into outer space after the incident in July and everything was fine, but Rick Mastracchio and Michael Hopkins do not feel at ease, afraid of drowning in space. Repair work is planned to be carried out in three approaches — spacewalks are scheduled for December 21, December 23 and December 25.