NASA eliminates an all-female spacewalk because its space suit is in a bad size

March 26, 2019, 12:58 GMT

By Yuliya Talmazan

A first exit in the very feminine space, scheduled for Friday, has been abandoned because the International Space Station does not carry enough combinations in the right size.

Astronauts Anne McClain and Christina Koch are expected to make an outing in space together but "partly because of the availability of space suits on the station," these plans have been modified, NASA said in a statement on Monday.

The agency said that during his first spacewalk on March 22, with fellow astronaut Nick Hague, McClain realized that a medium-sized torso, which the agency calls "the shirt of the spacesuit Is best for him.

"As only one medium-sized torso can be prepared by Friday, Koch will wear it," NASA said.

Koch will now participate in an outing in space with Hague on March 29th, while McClain is expected to make his next spacewalk – the third in this series – on April 8th with Canadian astronaut David Saint Jacques.

Neither Koch nor McClain commented on the change of plans on their Twitter account, which astronauts frequently use to post updates from the International Space Station (ISS).

This announcement caused a stir on social media and many people wondered why NASA did not have enough wetsuits for women on the ISS.

"You have to like the irony that because women have never walked together before there are not enough costumes so that the exit into the space can not not take place " a Twitter user said. "What joke."

NASA spokeswoman Stephanie Schierholz told NBC News that there were two medium-sized hard-chest components in the space suit of the station, but one of them they are a spare part that would require additional work to be configured.

"It's more efficient to exchange astronauts than to reconfigure the elements of the spacesuit," Schierholz said in a written statement.

She says that McClain was trained in both a large size suit and a medium-sized field suit, but that the crew members' size requirements may change when they are in orbit.

The exit to the women's space was to include McClain and Koch in the space, assisted on the ground by flight directors Mary Lawrence and Kristen Facciol during the NASA Control mission at the Johnson Space Center in New York. Houston.

No regular battery exchange or daily routine. Pictures of the Anne & Nick outfit for their first outing in the space! 7 hours later, we managed to modernize our batteries, which allows us to have power even when we are in the shade of the sun! Nice day of teamwork on and off the Earth. pic.twitter.com/a3R6y2jC7Q

– Christina H Koch (@Astro_Christina) March 25, 2019

Koch and McClain were both selected as NASA astronaut candidates in 2013, the second highest number of candidates ever received by the space agency. Of the eight candidates selected in 2013, half were women, representing a mix of scientists and military pilots.

In 1963, Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly in space. NASA's astronaut, Sally Ride, became the first American in space when she was boarded on the space shuttle Challenger in 1983 within a crew of five people.

According to NASA, McClain became the 13th woman to make an exit in space on March 22nd. Koch will become the 14th woman to perform the feat on March 29th. A total of 214 space trips have been made to the space station since December 1998.