The home for space-station astronauts that is being built in Huntsville, Ala., at the Marshall Space Flight Center might irk Capt. James T. Kirk, commander of the starship Enterprise in ”Star Trek.”
If the television hero from the 23d Century beamed himself from the Enterprise, which is as spacious and comfortable as a Miami Beach condo, into the astronauts` quarters of the space station in 1996, he would find them primitive. He would be nauseated by the weightlessness of space, as are most astronauts. He wouldn`t be able to march around, either. Instead, he would alternately float freely or swing from bar to bar inside the crew quarters, which are no bigger than a mobile home.
Kirk would see no comfortable sofa or chair; he would sleep standing up in a compartment slightly larger than a telephone booth. His urine, sweat and breath would be recycled for use in the dishwasher and clothes washer.
Kirk might ask his science officer, Mr. Spock, for a quick beam back to the Enterprise. But astronauts who lived 15 years ago in Skylab, the world`s first space station, are impressed with the Marshall Center`s full-scale mockup of the new living quarters. ”I feel good when I go in the habitation module,” says Gerald P. Carr, who commanded the 84-day Skylab 3 mission and now works as a consultant to the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration.
The mockup represents the efforts of hundreds of technicians, environmental psychologists, architects, engineers and spacecraft designers from NASA and the Boeing Co., which has the contract to build the habitation module. They are trying to design a place for eight men and women to work, sleep, eat, exercise, relax and enjoy themselves in the hostile environment of space. The shape, layout and color of the area must not only overcome size limitations, but also elevate the astronauts` moods and promote their productivity during their tours of three to six months. That, at any rate, is the goal.
There are so many demands on this tiny space capsule that, after almost five years of research, NASA and Boeing are only beginning to close in on a preliminary design. In agency argot, the mockup at Marshall represents only
”medium fidelity” to the basic design criteria. ”We are trying to get technology to catch up with science fiction,” says Charles M. Lewis, chief of the Manned Systems Integration Branch at Marshall.
The United States, the European Space Agency and Japan are each providing a laboratory module on the space station, and Canada is helping design a crane to assemble the station in space. The primary mission is to study man`s adaptation to space, observe the solar system and manufacture such high-technology materials as crystals used in computers.
Far-reaching payoffs
But no matter what happens to the space station program, NASA scientists say they have already made contributions to interior design on Earth. ”We`re trying to blend science, art and engineering to advise spacecraft designers on creative environments for humans in space, but I`ve always thought the spinoff for terrestial environments is the much wider use for our work,” says Yvonne Clearwater, an environmental psychologist at the NASA Ames Research Center in California.
She was referring to NASA`s five years of research on the elements of interior design that help people relax and reach their highest levels of creativity and productivity. That research has been boiled down to set the requirements for the home in space. Now architects, designers and engineers at NASA and Boeing are testing design solutions in the mockup.
The habitation module-crew quarters-will include about a fifth of the space station`s pressurized area. Modules for the three laboratories and the living quarters will be connected by cylindrical nodes, which provide observation windows, control stations and storage. A ”logistics” module serves as a kitchen pantry and equipment storeroom; every 45 days a space shuttle will replace it with a fully stocked module and carry garbage and completed experiments back to Earth. The space station will stretch over an area 208 feet wide and 508 feet long.
Individual components will be built on Earth and carried aloft by space shuttles on 19 missions over a three-year period starting in 1995. Astronauts will assemble the station.
The habitation module will cost several billion dollars. The dimensions of the module-43 feet long and 14.5 feet in diameter-are dictated by the payload bay of a space shuttle. A corridor 7 feet wide and 7 feet high cuts through the center of the cylindrical module, leaving rounded slices of space about 3 feet deep along all four sides of the corridor. Eight sleeping compartments are clustered at one end; the kitchen, dining room and exercise area are at the other end, and in the middle are a shower, dressing area, toilet, medical testing equipment and central command center for the space station.
Very little is familar in this home in space. The kitchen doesn`t have a sink, counter or range, and there is only one drawer for utensils. The area looks more like a mainframe computer, 8 feet wide and 7 feet tall. Built into this box are two microwave-convection ovens, push-button water spigots, a computer terminal for food inventories, a dishwasher and storage cabinets for 14 days of ”airplane food,” as a NASA official describes it.
Lots to look at
Astronauts will float with their food trays to a nearby table and slip their feet into stirrups on the floor to keep stationary while they eat. At the table they might watch a wall-mounted television, gaze at the Earth through two 20-inch portholes or use the popup computer terminal at each place. An astronaut could check the laundry spinning underfoot; the clothes washer is built into the floor.
The semi-oval table is designed to discourage cliques and promote good
”psychosocial group dynamics,” says Joseph P. Hale, a specialist in human engineering at Marshall.
Because they are weightless in space, astronauts do not need furniture. As they relax, they assume a ”neutral body posture” similar to that of a person floating in water. To save space, each will sleep vertically in a sleeping bag hung on the wall of his or her 42- by 46-inch cubicle, a marvel of efficient planning containing storage, audio and video systems and a computer work station. ”Astronauts will be able to go inside, slide the door closed, listen to music, call home or do whatever they want,” Hale says.
There are two bathrooms. Traffic jams will be reduced by scheduling; the crew works in two 12-hour shifts. The shower looks like a shower, but the hand-held wand provides both water and a vacuum to remove it. Fans and vacuum devices also help eliminate waste from the toilet and from a plastic bubble where hands are washed. Astronauts shave in the shower and swallow their toothpaste.
Sometime in the next few years, depending on federal financing and mission scheduling, Marshall and Boeing program managers say they will
”freeze technology” and draw up a preliminary plan for the habitation module. After a NASA review, Boeing will draw up the final plan and build a testing model. Only then will Boeing build the habitation module that will be sent into space. –
