9 ms·

More on what astronauts found “objectionable” and “distasteful” with Apollo's system, from the PDF linked in the OP (1): "In general, the Apollo waste manageme

by 0x38B 6mo ago

More on what astronauts found “objectionable” and “distasteful” with Apollo's system, from the PDF linked in the OP (1): "In general, the Apollo waste management system worked satisfactorily from an engineering standpoint. From the point of view of crew acceptance, however, the system must be given poor marks. The principal problem with both the urine and fecal collection systems was the fact that these required more manipulation than crewmen were used to in the Earth environment and were, as a consequence, found to be objectionable. The urine receptacle assembly represented an attempt to preclude crew handling of urine specimens but, because urine spills were frequent, the objective of “sanitizing” the process was thwarted. The fecal collection system presented an even more distasteful set of problems. The collection process required a great deal of skill to preclude escape of feces from the collection bag and consequent soiling of the crew, their clothing, or cabin surfaces. The fecal collection process was, moreover, extremely time consuming because of the level of difficulty involved with use of the system. An Apollo 7 astronaut estimated the time required to correctly accomplish the process at 45 minutes.* Good placement of fecal bags was difficult to attain; this was further complicated by the fact that the flap at the back of the constant wear garment created an opening that was too small for easy placement of the bags.** As was noted earlier, kneading of the bags was required for dispersal of the germicide. *Entry in the log of Apollo 7 by Astronaut Walter Cunningham. **The configuration of the constant wear garments on later Apollo missions were modified to correct this problem." 1: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19760005603/downloads/19760005603.pdf* https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19760005603/downloads/19...

pbhjpbhj 6mo ago
Did they not have the astronauts simulate the mission beforehand, on Earth? Wear the clothing, eat the meals, use the toilet, etc? It sounds like that would have allowed them to fix the suit before they went? They must have eaten the meals and such to be sure they could function, make sure they didn't have any intolerance, for example?
- malfist 6mo ago
  How do you simulate zero gravity on earth?
  - MichaelApproved 6mo ago
    Reduced gravity aircraft. AKA the Vomit Comet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced-gravity_aircraft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced-gravity_aircraft
    - jryb 6mo ago
      You only get ~30 seconds of zero G. How would that work?
      - YeGoblynQueenne 6mo ago
        Hold it in for three days. Then you're ready to go in a flash.
        dlcarrier 6mo ago
        That would probably make it take longer. A safer bet would be three really strong cups of coffee and two bran muffins.
        spike021 6mo ago
        or get someone who's lactose intolerant and make them drink a carton of milk.
  - __MatrixMan__ 6mo ago
    Perhaps buoyancy could be a decent substitute, at least for the solid waste part. I imagine being waist deep and flushing the entire bathroom after each training session. Maybe some kind of spatula/squeegee might assist with separation, coupled with a robotic spatula cleaner and sanitizer. There would be a monitor and cameras so you could calibrate your aim. What an odd workday that would be.
- smallmancontrov 6mo ago
  Warning: gross Of course, but the fundamental problem is that difficulties compound. It starts with: pooping is much harder when gravity isn't there to persistently tug on the turd. Something that is slightly obnoxious on Earth (using a bag, using a suit flap) turns into an absolute trainwreck when you have a bag, a suit flap, and turd separation failure. Now you have to do precise mechanical manipulation of an object you don't want to touch behind your back through a bag and a suit flap, every failure multiplies the work, and now the turds can float away to multiply the work outside your immediate vicinity. Ditto for kneading the antibacterial into the poo: if you fail to do this thoroughly on Earth, bacterial offgassing causes the bag to vent, but in all likelihood that's the end of it because you can arrange for gravity to keep the poo away from the vent. In fact, you would probably do this without even thinking or imagining how it could go wrong. In zero gravity, you can't simply arrange "vent on top, poo on bottom", so the event is likely to launch aerosolized poo into your living environment where you have to put up with it for the next few days. It's difficult to fully appreciate gravity until it's gone. Astronauts are heroes for the risks they take, but they are also heroes for dealing with this.
  - asdff 6mo ago
    Seems like a big issue is I'm guessing insistence on having this be a solo operation for cultural reasons. Seems like it would be easy with two astronauts. Have the one bend over and spread the cheeks wide with both hands, the other basically does the hand in the dog poop bag trick right as the poop is coming out and wipes them up after. No worse than what a nurse does every day for work.
    - hammock 6mo ago
      > Seems like a big issue is I'm guessing insistence on having this be a solo operation for cultural reasons What cultures are you aware of that do pair programming for poopies?
    - yoz-y 6mo ago
      Do they eat things that will 100% avoid liquid stool?
- somenameforme 6mo ago
  Apollo was largely driven with the purpose of achieving the goal rather than obsessing on the details on the way to that goal. In fact during Apollo they even completely scrapped mathematical risk modeling because the results it always gave were basically 'you die.' So for instance a relevant and famous anecdote is that the original tests for Apollo launches didn't have any sort of urine/fecal disposal systems at all. In one delayed launch during testing Alan Shepard was in the capsule for hours and ended up needing to go pee. He asked for permission to depart the capsule, but that was declined to keep it all on track. So he ended up having to just pee all over himself in the suit. Another piss poor anecdote is Buzz Aldrin on the Moon! When he departed the lunar lander capsule, the impact ended up breaking the urine collection device inside his suit. So his journey on the Moon involved having a healthy dose of urine sloshing around in his boot where it settled. Of course there's a balance in all things. It's not like they just YOLO'd their way to the Moon. But things where the worst case outcome would be astronaut discomfort were seen as extremely low priority. In the original design, the capsule didn't even have a window or manual controls. So the astronauts were basically just being treated like human Laikas. They had to fight just to get those 'features.' --- I think a big part of the reason for this is because there are basically infinite things that can go wrong. And so if you obsess on getting every single thing right, you'll end up never doing anything at all. In 1962 Kennedy gave his famous 'to the Moon' speech. At that time, we'd only just barely put the first man in orbit but had never done anything beyond that, at all. Just 7 years later a man would walk on the Moon. In modern times we've been basically trying to recreate what we did in the 60s, and spent decades doing so. And this obsession on the details is certainly a big part of the reason why.
  - ErroneousBosh 6mo ago
    > In fact during Apollo they even completely scrapped mathematical risk modeling because the results it always gave were basically 'you die.' I've had a similar conversation with the "but if we really went to the Moon in 1969 why has it taken so long to be able to do it again" folk a few times. The real answer is of course that we did it once, and realised that a project where about 99% of the failure modes are "astronauts turn into a rapidly expanding cloud of fried mince" and all of these failure modes are incredibly likely was not something we really wanted to do again.
RataNova 6mo ago
How much of aerospace design used to treat the crew as an adapter bolted onto the machine

by 0x38B 6mo ago

pbhjpbhj 6mo ago

Did they not have the astronauts simulate the mission beforehand, on Earth? Wear the clothing, eat the meals, use the toilet, etc? It sounds like that would have allowed them to fix the suit before they went? They must have eaten the meals and such to be sure they could function, make sure they didn't have any intolerance, for example?

malfist 6mo ago
How do you simulate zero gravity on earth?
- MichaelApproved 6mo ago
  Reduced gravity aircraft. AKA the Vomit Comet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced-gravity_aircraft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reduced-gravity_aircraft
  - jryb 6mo ago
    You only get ~30 seconds of zero G. How would that work?
    - YeGoblynQueenne 6mo ago
      Hold it in for three days. Then you're ready to go in a flash.
      - dlcarrier 6mo ago
        That would probably make it take longer. A safer bet would be three really strong cups of coffee and two bran muffins.
      - spike021 6mo ago
        or get someone who's lactose intolerant and make them drink a carton of milk.
- __MatrixMan__ 6mo ago
  Perhaps buoyancy could be a decent substitute, at least for the solid waste part. I imagine being waist deep and flushing the entire bathroom after each training session. Maybe some kind of spatula/squeegee might assist with separation, coupled with a robotic spatula cleaner and sanitizer. There would be a monitor and cameras so you could calibrate your aim. What an odd workday that would be.
smallmancontrov 6mo ago
Warning: gross Of course, but the fundamental problem is that difficulties compound. It starts with: pooping is much harder when gravity isn't there to persistently tug on the turd. Something that is slightly obnoxious on Earth (using a bag, using a suit flap) turns into an absolute trainwreck when you have a bag, a suit flap, and turd separation failure. Now you have to do precise mechanical manipulation of an object you don't want to touch behind your back through a bag and a suit flap, every failure multiplies the work, and now the turds can float away to multiply the work outside your immediate vicinity. Ditto for kneading the antibacterial into the poo: if you fail to do this thoroughly on Earth, bacterial offgassing causes the bag to vent, but in all likelihood that's the end of it because you can arrange for gravity to keep the poo away from the vent. In fact, you would probably do this without even thinking or imagining how it could go wrong. In zero gravity, you can't simply arrange "vent on top, poo on bottom", so the event is likely to launch aerosolized poo into your living environment where you have to put up with it for the next few days. It's difficult to fully appreciate gravity until it's gone. Astronauts are heroes for the risks they take, but they are also heroes for dealing with this.
- asdff 6mo ago
  Seems like a big issue is I'm guessing insistence on having this be a solo operation for cultural reasons. Seems like it would be easy with two astronauts. Have the one bend over and spread the cheeks wide with both hands, the other basically does the hand in the dog poop bag trick right as the poop is coming out and wipes them up after. No worse than what a nurse does every day for work.
  - hammock 6mo ago
    > Seems like a big issue is I'm guessing insistence on having this be a solo operation for cultural reasons What cultures are you aware of that do pair programming for poopies?
  - yoz-y 6mo ago
    Do they eat things that will 100% avoid liquid stool?
somenameforme 6mo ago
Apollo was largely driven with the purpose of achieving the goal rather than obsessing on the details on the way to that goal. In fact during Apollo they even completely scrapped mathematical risk modeling because the results it always gave were basically 'you die.' So for instance a relevant and famous anecdote is that the original tests for Apollo launches didn't have any sort of urine/fecal disposal systems at all. In one delayed launch during testing Alan Shepard was in the capsule for hours and ended up needing to go pee. He asked for permission to depart the capsule, but that was declined to keep it all on track. So he ended up having to just pee all over himself in the suit. Another piss poor anecdote is Buzz Aldrin on the Moon! When he departed the lunar lander capsule, the impact ended up breaking the urine collection device inside his suit. So his journey on the Moon involved having a healthy dose of urine sloshing around in his boot where it settled. Of course there's a balance in all things. It's not like they just YOLO'd their way to the Moon. But things where the worst case outcome would be astronaut discomfort were seen as extremely low priority. In the original design, the capsule didn't even have a window or manual controls. So the astronauts were basically just being treated like human Laikas. They had to fight just to get those 'features.' --- I think a big part of the reason for this is because there are basically infinite things that can go wrong. And so if you obsess on getting every single thing right, you'll end up never doing anything at all. In 1962 Kennedy gave his famous 'to the Moon' speech. At that time, we'd only just barely put the first man in orbit but had never done anything beyond that, at all. Just 7 years later a man would walk on the Moon. In modern times we've been basically trying to recreate what we did in the 60s, and spent decades doing so. And this obsession on the details is certainly a big part of the reason why.
- ErroneousBosh 6mo ago
  > In fact during Apollo they even completely scrapped mathematical risk modeling because the results it always gave were basically 'you die.' I've had a similar conversation with the "but if we really went to the Moon in 1969 why has it taken so long to be able to do it again" folk a few times. The real answer is of course that we did it once, and realised that a project where about 99% of the failure modes are "astronauts turn into a rapidly expanding cloud of fried mince" and all of these failure modes are incredibly likely was not something we really wanted to do again.

RataNova 6mo ago

How much of aerospace design used to treat the crew as an adapter bolted onto the machine