cheryl
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NASA Alarmed That Astronauts’ Spacesuits Keep Filling Up With Water
The suits are officially off the table until they figure out what went wrong.
The spacesuits that allow astronauts to venture outside of the International Space Station have been declared “no-go” for upcoming spacewalks.That’s because the suits’ helmets keep filling with excess water, a potentially life threatening scenario astronauts have been battling with on multiple occasions, CBS reports.
The massive and unwieldy suits, referred to as “extra-vehicular mobility units,” (EMUs) aren’t entirely off the table and could still be used in emergencies, according to NASA.
“Until we understand better what the causal factors might have been during the last EVA with our EMU, we are no-go for nominal [extra-vehicular activity],” Dana Weigel, deputy manager of the space station program at the Johnson Space Center, told reporters on Tuesday, as quoted by CBS. “So we won’t do a planned EVA until we’ve had a chance to really address and rule out major system failure modes.”