When news broke that that all-female space walk was canceled, former First Lady and presidential nominee Hillary Clinton took to Twitter with a suggestion for NASA.
Make another suit. https://t.co/mu9w13xsi0
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 26, 2019
“Make another suit.” Clinton’s tweet said, but it’s not that simple.
Anna McClain, the female astronaut who was set float through space with Christina Koch during a spacewalk at the International Space Station (ISS), made the call, not NASA.
“This decision was based on my recommendation,” McClain said in a tweet. “Leaders must make tough calls, and I am fortunate to work with a team who trusts my judgment. We must never accept a risk that can instead be mitigated. Safety of the crew and execution of the mission come first.”
It takes about 12 hours to prepare a suit for a spacewalk, 12 hours that McClain and the rest of her team weren’t willing to give up as their schedule is jam-packed with important scientific work. So, it wasn’t that there wasn’t a suit available, it just took too much time to prep it for use.
McClain went on a spacewalk last week in a large-sized suit and felt uncomfortable enough to acknowledge that a change needed to be made. During training on Earth and on the ISS she had worn both medium and large size suits, but once she was in space for a while, she says, she grew two inches (astronauts often gain a few inches as it’s normal for their spine to relax and elongate when Earth’s gravitational pull isn’t tugging on it).
Thanks for reading InsideHook. Sign up for our daily newsletter and be in the know.
