Questions tagged [crewed-spaceflight]
Crewed spaceflight (also referred to as human spaceflight or manned spaceflight) is space travel with a crew aboard the spacecraft. When a spacecraft is crewed, it can be operated directly, as opposed to being remotely operated or autonomous.
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Have there ever been any incidents where something valuable was unintentionally thrown out with the trash?
In "What do astronauts do with their trash on the ISS?", a commentator asked the title question and was encouraged to make it a new question, but apparently never did.
The linked question is ...
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New spin on laundry day: How will ISS cope with washing machine vibration and angular momentum?
Although the ISS currently has no laundry facilities, NASA’s Glenn Research Center sponsored a washing machine design contest to do the drudgery during spaceflight. Plans have been made for testing a ...
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Dealing with lunar regolith
NASA has announced its intention to return astronauts to the Moon by 2024. Various other questions and answers here address the many dangers and difficulties posed by the fine and abrasive particles ...
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Is the ISS in danger of the outer radiation belt?
Is the ISS in danger of the outer radiation belt? I know that the ISS is in the low earth orbit and that it briefly passes through the base of the outer RB, but it is actually in danger? How does the ...
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Why is there no common "docking" interface for express rack payloads?
It seems strange to me that given all of the concerns about living space and color palette aboard ISS, the data/power/cooling ports for different mid-deck locker equivalent (MLE) express rack payloads ...
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Looking for Apollo Flight Control Hardware Blueprints (such as RHC, THC and COAS)
I've been looking to build replicas of Apollo flight control hardware such as RHC, THC, ACA, TTCA and COAS, and am looking for detailed engineering drawings that show dimensions and internal ...
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What to do until the hearse arrives: is there a designated morgue on ISS?
When I have asked, every commercial ocean-going vessel I’ve been on has provision for a refrigerated morgue. In the good old days, it was a cannon ball at your feet and six feet of sail cloth with the ...
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Duration of SpaceX Demo-2 mission
I've read that the duration of the current SpaceX demo mission to the ISS and back is highly variable. It was originally estimated they could be on-board the ISS from 1 to 4 months, and currently ...
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What specific contributions have ballooning experiments made to manned space flight?
I am vaguely aware that the US space program wasn't just kicked off after Sputnik. There is a history of balloons and sounding rockets that never seem to get mentioned in the books I've read, and ...
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Can New Shepard launch from Texas and deliver payload (people) to Florida?
Can New Shepard be used as transportation instead of a joy ride?
Is there any meaningful flight where you launch from Texas, and land somewhere nearby like California or Florida?
If it can't be done ...
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How many hours/week on the ISS is spent on science vs maintenance?
This was asked in 2016 : Does ISS crew exercise time count toward their X hour work week? The answer as of 2016 was 40 hours / week for a crew of 6.
But as noted there, when the crew size increases to ...
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How close a crewed spacecraft could orbit Jupiter?
How close could a crewed spacecraft orbit Jupiter?
I read that Juno was as close as 5,000 km from Jupiter's top clouds, but I'm wondering about a spacecraft with humans inside (provided it's protected ...
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Is there a publicly available inventory of things sent to the ISS?
I spent some time looking through NASA datasets and news articles, and couldn't find anything, so I'm hoping that someone in the community will know better than I do:
I'm trying to understand what the ...
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How similar to a crewed flight will SpaceX Demo Mission 1 be?
With the upcoming premiere of the Dragon 2 in SpaceX's DM1 launch, I was wondering how similar it will be to a mission with actual astronauts. What I mean by this is things like:
Will the launch ...
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Were all the rockets in the Atlas family man-rated?
Based off what I can find online, and in history books; only the first Atlas rocket could send crew into space, but there is potential for man rates Atlas v rockets (which man rating about that has ...
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With the new (Feb 2022) NASA SpaceX Crew Dragon contract extension, how much per flight?
NASA awarded flights 7, 8, and 9 for Crew Dragon in an extension of the existing contract, bringing the total value to \$3,490,872,904 . We know that in 2014 SpaceX was awarded about $2.6 billion to ...
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Deorbit of ISS is a unique event. Are there plans for scientific observation?
The ISS deorbit will be unique. Not only because of its mass, but because the time, location and observing conditions can be accurately chosen. Instruments could be placed for detailed observation. ...
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What are the G forces the Dragon 2 crew experience during splashdown? And what is the seat angle for the current configuration of 4 astronauts?
The Dragon 2 has a crew capacity of seven, but, NASA decided to change the specification for the angle of the ship’s seats due to concerns about the g-forces crew members might experience during ...
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Which crewed spacecraft provides the gentlest ascent?
The Space Shuttle is considered to be the spacecraft with the gentlest decent and landing. I was surprised to learn that its ascent was quite a rough experience.
So I was wondering: Which orbital ...
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Book Recommendation on History of Spaceflight
I'm a CS/Engineering student at CalTech and I'm searching for a book that can help me better understand the history of spaceflight and the problems associated with getting humans to space. Since this ...
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Why is the Fuji capsule design philosophy not seen in other proposals?
Fuji is my favorite unflown dead spacecraft proposal (narrowly beating out Dynasoar). I am well aware of why Fuji has its weird/unique design, but what I'm curious about is why it's unique. In my ...
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Potential catastrophic death on the ISS from mistakes
Other than from decompression and fire, what other ways has NASA or the Russian space program identified unique ways someone on the ISS could die suddenly, in particular from human error with the ...
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Fuel carried by current Crew Dragon
How much fuel weight will the current Crew Dragon carry? Will it be just enough for launch abort, or the full load (over 3000 lbs) needed for propulsive landing as a back-up to the parachutes?
I ...
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Atmospherics for 'next generation' manned space flight / Exploratory Class Missions
Decompression sickness is a significant risk to both current and future astronauts and currently significant time is lost in preparation for extra-vehicular activity on the ISS [including airlock ...
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How does US crewed launch abort coverage "jump" the ocean in an instant?
As I understand things, the Commercial Crew Program stipulates full abort coverage from pad to orbit. An abort to the middle of the Atlantic ocean is understandably not acceptable.
Watching the OFT-2 ...
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short duration of crew 4 mission
I am wondering why the crew 4 mission is (for the moment) only planned for 4 and half months and not the usual 6-6.5 months? Thanks.
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Are there examples of spaceflight equipment being redesigned to remove right hand bias? (To make it less difficult to use left-handed)
Writing First left-handed primate on the Moon? First in space? got me thinking. The first left-handed astronaut may "break a barrier" but not all barrier-breakings result in an improvement ...
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Cats and dogs in microgravity; how much information is there on their locomotive ability or adaptability in space? Is there anything at all?
Cats and dogs are both known to be very popular pets for humans around the world and have been bred for thousands of years for this purpose.
Destin Sandlin's Slow Motion Flipping Cat Physics | Smarter ...
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What are the advantages and disadvantages of certain radial symmetries in spacecraft construction?
I'm mainly considering the merits and drawbacks of threefold versus fourfold (or higher, like sixfold and eightfold) radial symmetries when it comes to the construction of a fuselage for a spacecraft ...
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In Crew Dragon do the astronauts feel like flying upside-down?
When looking at Crew Dragon flight paths diagrams I saw that for phasing burns and deorbit burns they don't use the side thrusters, as I would expect, but four thrusters mounted at the "top" ...
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Astronauts' sleeping heart rate on the ISS
On Earth during non-REM sleep a person's heart rate goes down. Does the same thing happen on the ISS, or does the non-REM sleeping heart rate remain close to the heart rate of the astronaut while ...
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Aerosol products in space
I am assuming aerosol products are not used inside the living environment of a spacecraft while it is microgravity. Is that correct, or are there examples of such products being used while an ...
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Soyuz reentry acceleration profile with timing
I am looking for reentry Soyuz acceleration profile with timing. I was able to find graphs for ascent, but failed to find anything related with descent. The only thing I've got is Andreas Mogensen ...
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Pre-launch TLEs for NASA launches
I was curious if the United States is on the verge of launching maned flights to the ISS, will anyone release Pre-Launch TLE data like was done back when the shuttle was flying.
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What is a current/good Mass Estimating Equation/Heuristic for space radiators/heating systems?
Has anyone does any analysis for thermal control systems for manned space habitats? I know Gilmore has data for unmanned systems, but I was looking for data for unmanned systems, preferably to develop ...
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Space astro/cosmo-naut rejection due to fine veins
Related to the question, Are all modern astronauts at least passable phlebotomists?
Some people have clearly defined veins which allow for easy insertion of needles or cannulas, however, some people ...
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Is electric propulsion feasible for human spaceflight?
I have been reading a lot about electric propulsion and was wondering if it would be feasible for human spaceflight. It is really efficient but it takes a while to get to the desired speed. Would it ...
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What are the innovative aspects of New Shepard's "retro-thrust system on the bottom of the capsule"?
Background:
The final velocity of the capsule after the main parachutes are deployed is a balance; it should always be slow enough that the crew is not injured and for reusable capsules and for space ...
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What's the farthest an ISS astronaut gets from the station's center of mass during routine activities? At 0.5°/s what centrifugal effects are there?
This answer to Are there really “Dead End” signs on the outside of the International Space Station? won't be helpful here since for the purposes of this question spacewalks aren't part of routine ...
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What kind of impact tests to large touch screen displays in crew capsules have to pass?
Some of the glass layers in commercial large format displays are between 0.25 and 0.7 mm thick. (e.g. 1, 2) If something comes loose in a capsule during a high acceleration period (launch, reentry) ...
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What do the double- or triple-checkers do when a launch is not scheduled?
Leading up to every manned launch, there is personnel dedicated to making sure their colleagues do everything correctly in accordance to checklists they usually have on hand.
See for example the ...
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Avoiding Martian contamination with Earth microbes
Unmanned probes can be sterilized, but when humans begin occupying Mars in large quantities, how can contamination of possible Martian microbes with Earth microbes be avoided?
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Why was the SpaceX Demo 2 spashdown livestream so devoid of visuals?
Today's successful splashdown was tremendously boring compared to what we are used to from SpaceX launches. The mission statistics, the timeline, inner cockpit, etc was not shown during the telecast. ...
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How will the recovery of the first crewed Crew Dragon water recover differ from previous recoveries of Crew and Cargo flavors?
The NASA video Expedition 63 Inflight with New York Times, Fox News, and USA Today - July 7, 2020 includes an interview with Fox News reporter Bill Hemmer, who asks:
I am most interested in your ...
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Are there any crewed missions planned or designed for high orbit/cislunar space?
We talk a lot about going to The Moon again, but what about very high Earth orbit, say geostationary and beyond? Are there any plans for crewed missions? If so, what would their goals have been?
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Can the different "additional" demands on the Space Shuttle be broken down in terms of additional demands on hardware? How so?
Related: Could Space Shuttle's wings be diminished?
During the sanctioning and early development of the Space Shuttle, things got somewhat budget-political, and a number of additional design ...
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SpaceX Crew Dragon depressurization for emergency EVA
As far as I know, the Crew Dragon does not have an airlock. Therefore, if astronauts inside needed to go outside for some reason, they'd need to suit up, depressurize the cabin, and then they'd be ...
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What was the volume of the Space Shuttle orbiter, not just the crew cabin or cargo bay but the total volume of the entire craft?
For context, after an in-depth Google search, I asked the question "What was the volume of the Space Shuttle orbiter, not just the crew cabin or cargo bay but the total volume of the entire craft?" on ...
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How effective is the Orion radiation protection plan?
This article gives a basic overview of the procedure for astronauts on deep space missions who need to take shelter from energetic events such as solar flares. The shelter area strongly resembles a ...
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why do astronauts in the ISS still use wired microphones?
While I watched the DM-1 hatch opening, I noticed that astronauts use the wired microphone to talk to Huston.
It was particularly strange seeing that even because during hatch opening, they were ...
