In his Own Words: Luca Parmitano on Nearly Drowning
EVA 23: exploring the frontier, Luca Parmitano Blog
“At this exact moment, just as I’m thinking about how to uncoil the cable neatly (it is moving around like a thing possessed in the weightlessness), I ‘feel’ that something is wrong. The unexpected sensation of water at the back of my neck surprises me – and I’m in a place where I’d rather not be surprised. I move my head from side to side, confirming my first impression, and with superhuman effort I force myself to inform Houston of what I can feel, knowing that it could signal the end of this EVA. On the ground, Shane confirms they have received my message and he asks me to await instructions. Chris, who has just finished, is still nearby and he moves towards me to see if he can see anything and identify the source of the water in my helmet.
… As I move back along my route towards the airlock, I become more and more certain that the water is increasing. I feel it covering the sponge on my earphones and I wonder whether I’ll lose audio contact. The water has also almost completely covered the front of my visor, sticking to it and obscuring my vision. I realise that to get over one of the antennae on my route I will have to move my body into a vertical position, also in order for my safety cable to rewind normally. At that moment, as I turn ‘upside-down’, two things happen: the Sun sets, and my ability to see – already compromised by the water – completely vanishes, making my eyes useless; but worse than that, the water covers my nose – a really awful sensation that I make worse by my vain attempts to move the water by shaking my head. By now, the upper part of the helmet is full of water and I can’t even be sure that the next time I breathe I will fill my lungs with air and not liquid. To make matters worse, I realise that I can’t even understand which direction I should head in to get back to the airlock. I can’t see more than a few centimetres in front of me, not even enough to make out the handles we use to move around the Station.”
Surely they must have some idea of what caused this? Good thing the Russians provide a back-up EVA capability. They save us once again.
Space is an unforgiving environment! which is why we need to crawl before we leap. go to Moon before we go to Mars. Only Space Cadets think we have it all nailed down and should skip the neighborhood and go to Mars first.
Fred – you’ve managed to find the ONE reason that nobody ever used for arguing for Mars first… I’ve never heard anyone saying “we’ve got it soooo nailed down that we should go to a more difficult destination first”
It’s exactly the opposite.
Mars surface suits are simpler than lunar ones, requiring (among many others) LESS thermal control, and are thus simpler, reducing the chance of incidents like this.
You may not agree with the Mars-first arguments, but at least get them right, or else you’re just arguing with a strawman.
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Other than that – holy c%^, what an experience – reminds me of the “hard” sci-fi I used tor read as a kid. zero-g water sticking to your nose and mouth – what a nightmare…
We should go to the moon and Mars simultaneously, once we have affordable recoverable lift to Leo.
Man, the irony of drowning in the emptiness of space. Thank goodness he was able to make it back inside in time! That was one scary incident!
We are reminded, once again, we are not yet in an era of routine space flight. The Moon (and the rest of space) is a harsh mistress indeed.
Indeed. If Parmitano had died then not only the future of ISS would be in jeopardy but commercial cargo and crew.
if you are right this is a big reason why it is so important to get lift to Leo cheap enough to get access to space free from public funded Space programs. Our getting free of earth could mean whether or not our kind continues to exist or not. I grow so tired of this FEAR drivel.
Space is a harsh mistress blah blah blah!!!!!
“if you are right…” Look at the cumulative 4 gap following Challenger and Columbia. And don’t forget how much pressure NASA came under from Congress to withdrawing U.S. astronauts from long-duration Mir missions following the collision with a Progress cargo ship in ’97.
My point is that the accidental death of any crewmember on ISS would make me fearful that the “FEAR drivel” (you wrote) could well force an indeterminate cessation in NASA HSF activities. Commercial (apart from Virgin Galactic) is still largely dependent upon federal dollars, meaning SpaceX and the others need ISS to keep orbiting with crew – uninterrupted.
YIKES!!
I’m an earthling living on my native planet. I am working with construction crews building a factory that will make giant tires for heavy earth moving equipment to mine resources in far off lands. We started the project just a handful but we are now about 600 strong. We work in a place which is much like a prison! Our Guards the green hats make sure that we are following the safety rules to the letter. We are told not hurry, but stop think be careful.
In spite of all this accidents have happened one Crane dropped a load over a worker it missed He was luckey. Another man was mixing mortar he was foolish enough to try to clean his mixer by sticking his shovel in it while it was on. It grabbed him and claimed a finger. A scissor lift was moving while extended toppled over breaking a mans arm. As hard as we try accidents will happen.
SHOULD WE STOP BUILDING THIS PLANT BECAUSE OF ACCIDENTS??? OF COURSE NOT!!!
That is really scary.
I wonder if he could have used his arms to move himself up and down (respective to his body) and take a breath at the bottom right as he starts to go back up since then the water would have descended maybe out of his helmet, or at least shaken down after a few tries. Or would the cohesiveness of the water sticking to the surfaces have been too strong? The spacewalk people might need to think about this for having a procedure to deal with it in case it ever happens again. Scary.