[FPSPACE] Death in space

[Jens Lerch]

Phillip Clark <psclark@dircon.co.uk> wrote:

> The orbital module had already been separated and the media over here had
> not picked up on the significance of this: if retrofire failed to take
> place there was no way the crew could have been rescued.   Since the
> docking equipment was on the orbital module, even if some propulsion could
> get the craft back to Mir it could not have docked.   If a rescue Soyuz
> had been launched then the crew could not have performed an EVA from their
> craft because they only had their pressure suits, not EVA suits, and I
> have always assumed that these could not be used for an emergency rescue
> EVA (maybe I am wrong about this !).   And, of course, the rescue Soyuz
> could not have docked with TM 5.

A pressure suit allows survival in a depressurized environment, 
just like a full EVA suit. The difference between the two is 
mobility, endurance, and protection of temperature extremes, 
radiation, and space debris. It is certainly possible to do a short 
emergency EVA, like leaving one vehicle and entering another vehicle 
stationkeeping a few feet away, in an ordinary pressure suit. 
The Shuttle rescue balls were considered at a time when the Shuttle 
crew was to wear shirt-sleeves the entire time. Today it should be 
possible to haul the crew in their orange pressure suit from one 
Shuttle to the other, assuming the second Shuttle is launched 
in time... 
It's even possible, but certainly very unpleasant, though not 
necessarily fatal, to be in hard vacuum without any pressure suit for 
a short period of time. The scene in 2001 Space Odyssey is not 
completely fictious.

-- 
Jens Lerch
jlerch@mail.com
http://jens.lerch.home.pages.de/