NASA Spacewalk Training + ‘Old Woman and the Moon’ Final Chapter

For this special edition Science IRL, you’re an astronaut about to go for a swim in your spacesuit. Then, short story concludes from prompt “‘Old Man and the Sea’ but on the moon, with ladies.”

Science in Real Life - Special Edition with Video!

NASA Astronaut Day in the Life: Training for Spacewalk in the World’s 25th Largest Pool

This is a special edition Science IRL answering questions readers had about how astronauts train for spacewalks. Special thanks to

Brian Scott Pauls

for his question about jet packs!

Photo credit NASA: images-assets.nasa.gov/image/jsc2005e07623/jsc2005e07623~orig.jpg

You’re standing beside a pool. A really big one. In the pool, there’s a full-size replica of a space station, and soon, you’ll be down there with it.

But you’re not quite dressed for it yet.

You’re in a mesh body suit that’s more rigid than your favorite fishnet stockings because there’s thin, rubber tubing zig-zagging all through it. There’s a big X of thicker tubing across your back and a fist-sized blue connector tied to your hip that will jack you into the air system of a spacesuit in just a few minutes. The bodysuit is white, and so is the discreet adult diaper cradling your nethers. A host of people are on the deck of the pool, about twelve of them in diving gear and another twelve with headsets and clipboards.

You’re at the Neutral Buoyancy Lab (NBL) in Houston, Texas, and everything here is meant to help you train for a spacewalk.

NASA Neutral Buoyancy Lab, Houston, TX

But before you start, a reporter has a few questions…

What will you be training to do today?

The International Space Station currently flying in Low Earth Orbit has some maintenance needs that can only be done from outside the craft. Astronauts perform work while in a spacesuit. The suit in spite of being high tech, is essentially a worker’s uniform. The Space Station was assembled by hand by crew in spacesuits, and it is maintained by crew in spacesuits.

For future Stations in Low Earth Orbit, this may not be the case. They may instead depend on robots or other means to manage the maintenance needs, and mainly use spacesuits for tourists for recreation.

Why do you train submerged in a pool?

Being in a pool allows astronauts to get accustomed to working in a spacesuit because it simulates low gravity.

Working in a Suit: As we discussed last time, spacesuits are inflated garments which take some getting used to. It is much more effort to move your arms in a pressurized suit than it is in a t-shirt. A typical 8 hour spacewalk, or Extra Vehicular Activity (EVA), can take up to 3,000 calories! It’s WORK.

Working in Microgravity: The pool simulates the microgravity of floating in space by virtue of buoyancy. In microgravity, your legs aren’t particularly good for getting you anywhere. Your arms are your primary tool for moving your body from place to place.

In microgravity, Newton’s Third Law reigns supreme over your movements: “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Because there’s low or no friction, and negligible gravity, it takes very little force to propel your body to where you want to go. It wouldn’t take much to propel you way further into a dangerous situation! This requires fine, purposeful movement that your arms are more suited to than your legs.

So how do you get around outside the spacecraft—using your arms to pull or push yourself?

Yes!

But! When you’re training on Earth in the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, thou shalt not make a swimming motion with your arms. This is one of the biggest habits to break in this training scenario. Recall the team of twelve divers I mentioned? One of their jobs is to “fly” the astronauts in the spacesuits from place to place if it is not possible for the astronaut to use their arms to pull or push themselves across the International Space Station mockup as they would in space. Using a swimming motion is much too haphazard a motion and could be dangerous in space.

One of the other divers’ jobs is to take meticulous video of your movements so you can study them later. If you’re a newbie and you make a “swimming” motion, you have to restart the operation you were performing.

Astronaut in Neutral Buoyancy Lab being transported or ‘flown’ by two NASA divers. Photo credit NASA images-assets.nasa.gov/image/jsc2009e119846/jsc2009e119846~orig.jpg

But what about the big jet packs we saw astronauts use?

In the Space Shuttle era, a few astronauts got to use a big jet pack called Manned Maneuvering Unit that they could fly around without being tethered to the Shuttle. This was discontinued since the Shuttle proved so versatile, NASA could place the spacecraft pretty much where they wanted right next to any target that astronauts or robotic arms could reach by other means.

However, a smaller version of the MMU called SAFER (Simplified Aid for EVA Rescue) is currently in use as a self-rescue device should an astronaut accidentally become untethered from the vehicle. The primary means of moving is by using your arms to propel yourself by gripping framework mounted on the external face of the Station.

Astronauts do train on the SAFER rescue device while they are submerged in the NBL on training sorties dedicated to it.

Left, astronaut in Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU). Right: astronaut on the left with only life support backpack; astronaut on the right is testing the SAFER—Shuttle’s tail fin in background. Photo credits NASA images-assets.nasa.gov/image/S84-27562/S84-27562~orig.jpg ; images-assets.nasa.gov/image/sts064-60-012/sts064-60-012~orig.jpg

So you said spacewalks can take up to 3,000 calories—that’s more than a marathon! Do you have water and snacks in the spacesuit?

You absolutely do have a little Capri-Sun style drinking pouch that’s mounted on your chest with a straw routed up through your helmet. You do not have snacks.

Why don’t you have snacks?

There’s no good way to ensure your snack doesn’t float around with you in your helmet since you can’t put your hands in there to grab it. It’s also tough to make solid food that doesn’t crumble—imagine having to stop work early because there’s a cloud of crumbs blocking your vision and getting up your nose!

Now that you’re done answering the reporter’s questions, you pull on your space suit legs, worm your way into the hard upper torso that’s mounted to a vertical frame, and one of those folks with a headset helps you into your helmet.

Now you’re in the suit and together you weigh hundreds of pounds. You’re belted into that frame where your suit is mounted, and you are hoisted in the air by a crane and submerged into the pool to go about your training.

Happy flying.

Video taken by me: audio on for voiceover from NASA employee, Robert Knight, describing training operations in the NBL. Spring of 2023.

---

Now for the Science Fiction:

The Exciting Conclusion of ‘Old Woman and the Moon’

Previously….lunar astronaut Serena Santiago’s spacesuit was leaking air at an alarming rate. She was rescued from by an intrepid rover and her friend. She convinced her doctor to help retrieve proof of aliens found in the ordeal.

Moonwalk back to Chapter 5

“Thank you, thank you—we are Dishonorable Discharge! Good night!” Serena kicked the bass drum and hit the snare.

It felt good to yell and hit stuff. The band was a life raft in the choppy seas of her rejected, forced-retirement life.

Alexis shrugged her guitar strap off her shoulder and turned to Serena. “Booze time?”

“Booze time.”

Serena looked out over the bar as the lights came up. At this hour, there was usually a line for last call. Her gaze caught on a gaggle of young women waiting at the edge of the stage.

“Don’t look now—I think we have… fans?” Serena muttered to her band members.

“No shit,” Alexis and Corrie chorused. They flinched, noticing the tender age of said fans. Alexis and Corrie, while ten years Serena’s junior, were themselves thirty years older than their fans.

It was both cute and intimidating.

Serena was spared this intimidation by the arrival of another.

Marylin Silva sauntered up to the stage, conspicuous in cutoff jean shorts and crop top in a crowd of NASA youngsters in blue jumpsuits (out too late on a Tuesday) and grisly reprobates (just starting their evenings). One of these tried to wolf whistle, eyeing Marylin’s chiseled midriff, but she pointedly began putting up her hair, flexing biceps that bulged like pine knots. The reprobate moved off to weaker prey.

The two women hadn’t spoken since the moon. Serena hadn’t known before now how badly she’d wanted to.

Marylin dug a spacesuit glove out of her purse.

“We need to talk,” Marylin said, pointing to the door.

“Booze?” Serena said pleadingly, pointing to the bar.

Outside under the stars, Serena and Marylin took nervous sips of cold beer.

They both started talking at once. Serena motioned for Marylin to continue.

“I’m sorry and I think you’re sorry too. Can we just bury the hatchet so I can tell you what I discovered about your gloves?”

“I have plenty to be sorry and thankful to you about,” Serena said.

Marylin rolled her eyes. “You’re mad at me for not sticking up for you with Commander.”

Serena flinched.

She was mad. Believing in aliens had made her undeniably crazy. No one remembered the rest of her accomplishments—her life.

Being a woman had always felt like one level of lesser social class. Being an old woman seemed another exponential step down. Being a crazy, old woman was such an outcast trope, Serena now had nightmares of being burned at the stake screaming ‘I want to believe’.

“I don’t really blame you. I would think I was crazy too.”

“I don’t think you’re crazy. I didn’t then. I didn’t understand. Still don’t. I’m sorry I didn’t speak up for you—ask questions like a damn scientist. But you’d just—left! Went on this secret suicide mission, and I was scared for you. I was mad and hurt, and then the photos of that monument didn’t glow like you said—the monument was unexplained but not alien. Then there was just a pile of regolith and chunks of pink spinel crystals in the sample container, not a glowing egg-shaped rock like you said. All I had left were punctures in your gloves that you could have done yourself. I didn’t think you would, but you’d just done this crazy suicide mission. It was too much to process and I was mad. So I didn’t speak up for you at Commander’s inquest. For that, I’m sorry.”

Serena’s heart tripped over itself. Her eyes stung.

All moments since the ‘inquest’ had been constricted, hard to breathe in.

Commander had staged it to make an example of Serena. Gathering the crew with all Serena’s evidence poured out on the table in the galley, the photos, the sample bags full of what had been some sort of time capsule memory in a glowing rock dissolved to dust and a few shiny pink gems. Any trace of phenomenal reduced to benign oddity in the glaring lights and eyes of the crew who’d already thought Serena was unhinged.

The crew moved through their bias predictably. But Marylin’s silence had burned like a brand pressed against Serena’s throat.

There was nothing to be done without an ally.

But Serena knew it was her own fault. She’d sworn not to be maudlin about it. Or about being fired from NASA the moment she landed back on Earth. She’d made this bed.

“I’ve felt awful about not telling you about the mission,” Serena said. “But I’d do it again in the same situation. All the parallel universe versions of me do it every time. I’m sorry, and also I’d do it again. So I kept myself from reaching out. Knowing it’s unreasonable for you to trust me again…”

“Why, you have another death wish mission planned?”

Serena laughed. “No. But given the right scenario…”

Marylin pinched the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger. “So... You weren’t talking to me just in case you had some other death-wish mission you’d lie to me about again?”

When Marylin lowered her hand, Serena saw it had been hiding a disbelieving grin.

“So, I’m a bit of an idiot when it comes to relationships. But I’m not crazy.”

“I think it also hurts to think I don’t believe you. It’s easier not talking about it,” Marylin said, looking down into her beer.

This was so obviously true, continuing the silence was all there was to do.

Serena settled herself down at a picnic table.

“Santiago, I believe you,” Marylin said quietly.

Serena’s head whipped up. Marylin pulled the glove out of her purse again. The whole palm was missing.

“Some of the char compounds around the punctures—I can’t identify them. I want your help. And I want to hear your story again. I know you can’t go to the lab—NASA’s huge loss by the way—but if I bring the data to you, will you help me?”

Serena reached out her hand and Marilyn’s met it halfway, taking a seat beside her on the bench.

Serena ached with relief.

The vice around her lungs eased off. But she couldn’t marshal the breath to say thank you—it was erratic with its new freedom. She met Marylin’s eye and found her friend smiling uncertainly. It probably looked like Serena was hyperventilating. Serena buried her face in her hands and laughed weakly, fondly at her body’s familiar fragility—the way she couldn’t hold vulnerability with grace. Like her center of gravity had suddenly shifted.

When Serena could speak again, she adopted Commander’s deep voice, the signature cocked head and scowl.

“So, you’ve stolen a suit glove, cut it to bits, and availed yourself of millions of taxpayer dollars-worth of laboratory equipment…”

“That’s not even the best part,” Marylin said.

Marylin dragged Serena off the picnic table over to her rusted truck across the dark parking lot. She whipped a corner of canvas covering the bed back. Silver glinted from a distant streetlight.

“He’s all yours. Decommissioned after he didn’t take orders from Commander on your little adventure.”

Serena peered down into he dark truck bed.

“Hi Watchdog,” she said, not expecting a response.

“Hello, Serena.”

Serena’s mouth dropped open. It must have taken Marylin so much work to reconfigure Watchdog off NASA’s network and restore him.

Marylin hooted with laughter.

“Worth. It.” Marylin said.

“What on Earth am I going to do with a lunar robot?!”

“Give him a name, teach him to fetch? He’s a NASA orphan, like you,” Marylin said.

Serena reached down and touched the blue logo on Watchdog’s flank.

“First, paint job,” she said. “Then, how would you like to do some gardening?”

Watchdog chirped, birdlike. It sounded giddy.

“Thank you,” Serena said.

“Nah. Thank me when we’ve got some proof and we restore your good name.”

“Even if we never do, I’m happy, Marylin. I thought Earth would be empty for me. And I was right. Until I saw you tonight. I’m so humbled—honored you’d do all this for me, especially after what I did. Your friendship is all the lunar souvenir I need.”

“Oh? So you don’t want to help me with the glove analysis that might lead us to a discovery about alien memory storage technology?”

“You know I won’t be able to sleep until we dig in.”

The pair laughed and clinked their pint glasses, raising them to toast the crescent moon.

The End…

Author’s Love Note to Y’all

Hey lovely reader, thanks for being with me so far!

If you’ve enjoyed my first short story/sciency newsletter mashup, let me know in the comments! I’d love to know what you liked and what you’d like more (or less!) of?

Please share it with a friend, fellow nerd, or that family member you keep meaning to reach out to.

Sincerely your nerd,

Rachel

Disclaimer

Though I aim to write near-future sci-fi with the boost of accuracy granted me as a space industry professional, there are many ways I take artistic license. Any resemblance to my employer’s or customers’ technology, or their private technical development strategies, are purely coincidental. I will not write about topics that are too conflicted to avoid the appearance of impropriety. The sci-fi section of my newsletter is fiction inspired by scientific advances that are described in the public domain, or already published at trade shows or other vectors. Primarily, I lean on what NASA and space companies advertise, but quoting and annotating everything as fact or fiction would infringe on the enjoyment of the story. If you have questions or concerns about something I’ve written, please don’t hesitate to reach out!