[ad_1]
This unusual looking space toilet will be tested by astronauts on the ISS.
NASA
A newly designed space toilet that best suits women is headed for the International Space Station. The new cabinet was packed inside a cargo ship that successfully fired Friday night at 6:16 pm PT from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia. The astronauts will try the toilet for the next few months.
The new toilet, which weighs almost 45 kilograms and is 71 centimeters high, is about half the size of the two Russian-made toilets already in use on the ISS. This new toilet is 65% smaller and almost half as light as the ISS toilets currently in use.
The new smaller toilet will be able to fit NASA’s Orion capsules, which will travel to the moon on future missions.
As previously announced, the new toilet has a folded seat, a new shape and redesigned urine funnels.
Here’s a closer look at the new space toilet that will be used on the ISS.
NASA
The microgravity toilets used on the ISS use suction to prevent waste from spilling during potty breaks into space, but the new system has a new shape that better suits the female anatomy. The toilet is also more suitable for collecting more waste than before.
“Cleaning up a mess is a big deal. We don’t want any leaks or leaks,” said Melissa McKinley, project manager for Johnson Space Center. The Guardian said. “Let’s just say that everything floats weightless.”
The new toilet system also weighs less than previous systems, is easier to use, provides greater comfort and performance to the crew, and adjusts urine so that it can be safely treated by spacecraft recycling systems, “according to a NASA report previously released in June.
The toilet will be in its own booth next to the old one on the US side of the space station. The toilet, currently located on the American side of the space station, was designed in the 1990s.
This new toilet of the universal waste management system will remain on the ISS until the end of the life of the space station.
What is life like on the International Space Station (photo)
View all photos
Source link
