Earlier today, Elon Musk released the first image of the official SpaceX Spacesuit on Instagram. Here’s What he said:
| First picture of SpaceX spacesuit. More in days to follow. Worth noting that this actually works (not a mockup). Already tested to double vacuum pressure. Was incredibly hard to balance esthetics and function. Easy to do either separately. |
The suits are meant to be worn by astronauts when riding inside the company’s Dragon Capsule. The capsule itself was first flown in 2012 and is used to deliver supplies and cargo to and from the International Space Station (ISS). The first manned test flight is expected to take place as early as 2018. The Dragon capsule is the first such vehicle to be built entirely by a private company.
The SpaceX spacesuits are pressure suits, so they’re not meant for spacewalks, but are worn by astronauts during transport to the International Space Station as a safety measure in case the capsule depressurizes.
The suits will be worn by NASA astronauts for the commercial crew program when SpaceX starts launching people to and from the ISS (a job currently carried out by the Russians with their Soyuz capsules). In January (2017), Boeing revealed its own spacesuit design that astronauts will wear on route to the ISS.
A mockup of the SpaceX suit appeared on Reddit about a year ago and it looks very similar to the actual suit revealed today.
The suits have a very sci-fi look and wouldn’t look out of place in a modern science fiction movie.
Filed under: Manned Space Flight
