First commercial passenger spacewalk on Dragon will involve depressurizing entire spacecraft
According to an interview to Space.com by the four crew members on next year’s private manned Dragon flight financed by Jared Isaacman, the spacewalk, the first involving commercial passengers, will include all four passengers, since Dragon will not have an airlock and will be depressurized entirely when the hatch opens.
“We’ve collectively taken the position that we’re all going for an EVA,” Isaacman said, adding that the spacecraft cabin is to be depressurized in a hard vacuum. “Whether you’re sticking your head outside, you are doing an EVA. We are contemplating two people on the outside of the vehicle,” Isaacman said, “and two would be inside making sure that everything is going correct.”
To accommodate the spacewalk, this Crew Dragon will not be outfitted with a transparent dome, as was the case for the Inspiration4 mission.
The mission is presenting targeting March ’23 for launch.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
According to an interview to Space.com by the four crew members on next year’s private manned Dragon flight financed by Jared Isaacman, the spacewalk, the first involving commercial passengers, will include all four passengers, since Dragon will not have an airlock and will be depressurized entirely when the hatch opens.
“We’ve collectively taken the position that we’re all going for an EVA,” Isaacman said, adding that the spacecraft cabin is to be depressurized in a hard vacuum. “Whether you’re sticking your head outside, you are doing an EVA. We are contemplating two people on the outside of the vehicle,” Isaacman said, “and two would be inside making sure that everything is going correct.”
To accommodate the spacewalk, this Crew Dragon will not be outfitted with a transparent dome, as was the case for the Inspiration4 mission.
The mission is presenting targeting March ’23 for launch.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Do not like.
Going for EVA with no airlock might be justified if there was something important to accomplish outside, but I don’t see what it is.
To test the EVA suit? Why not test it one at a time on the ISS, using an airlock with another safety astronaut wearing a current suit? Too much risk… for the sake of a “first”?!
Wonder why they don’t use an airlock similar to the one Alexi Leonov used on Voskhod 2 in 1965.
The reason to do it is compelling. The one paying the freight wants to. Should be end of story right there.
Seems to me that because every component and the entire system can be tested on earth in a vacuum chamber that it is safe. An airlock can fail too. Gemini did not have one either.
Why not test it one at a time on the ISS, using an airlock with another safety astronaut wearing a current suit? Too much risk… for the sake of a “first”?!
NASA has already prohibited private EVA’s on ISS, I’m afraid.
Anyhow, the nice thing is, SpaceX’s future for human space flight is Starship, not Dragon, and at last check, crewed Starship variants won’t, ah, lack for space for airlocks.
Much like Ron White’s take on Hurricanes, “It’s not THAT the wind is blowing, it’s WHAT the wind is blowing”, my FIRST thought was “Isn’t it RATHER COLD in SPACE?”!!! Now I would guess they have tested all the electronics and hydraulics for the vacuum of space, but I thought SPACE was EXTREMELY FRIGID!!! Imagine opening the hatch and ALL the electronics being FROZEN! They HOPEFULLY have some “space heaters” to keep the systems safe – ???? We’ll see!
The most important thing about this EVA is not that it is a 1st but that for the USA it is the 4th system and a return to our EVA capability. There was Gemini, Apollo, STS then a gap, and now Falcoln 9 + Dragon doing it Gemini style. It will work and be the only way that we can assemble things in space for a while. BTW the inside of Dragon will remain warm due to heaters, the outside facing the sun will be hot and parts in shadow cold.
Isn’t it RATHER COLD in SPACE?!!!
The heat content of space vacuum is, in essence, zero — because there’s essentially no matter in it. This means that a body in space which is shaded from the sun will gradually lose heat due to radiation until it ends up exceedingly cold.
However, technically the temperature of that surrounding space vacuum depends upon the velocities of the relatively few and rarified particles still flying through it, and (particularly in the inner Solar System), those speeds are likely to be high — meaning high temperature.