NASA working to resolve flooded helmet issue ahead of crucial spacewalks

With three complicated spacewalks planned in the coming days, NASA is rushing to resolve a spacesuit problem linked to a 2013 emergency when water dangerously flooded a European astronaut’s helmet. The spacesuits that will be worn by astronauts Barry Wilmore and Terry Virts on their ventures outside the International Space Station are in working order, NASA insist, but engineers are concerned about a recurring issue with a piece of equipment known as the fan pump separator, part of the spacesuit’s temperature control system.

The two suits we are going out with have operated every time we turned them on.

Kenneth Todd, International Space Station Operations and Integration manager

NASA was alerted to the problem when astronauts were doing spacesuit maintenance in December and found that the fan pump in one suit did not speed up as expected. The spacewalks are scheduled for February 20, 24 and March 1. The astronauts will be preparing cables and communications gear for new docking ports at the space station. The ports will be used by future astronaut crews launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, once the first commercial capsules are ready to fly people beginning in 2017.

Science NASA