NASA had originally planned to do an all-female spacewalk, but the plans have fell through due to the reason that they do not have enough space suits to fit the female astronauts. The plan was for Christina Koch and Anne McClain to take part in this mission on March 29th to walk outside the international space station (ISS) to install new batteries. Now Ms. McClain will have to give up her spot on the mission to a male colleague who will fit into the size large spacesuit.
Ms. McClain had trained for the mission in both a large and medium suit and thought that the large would be fine, but after a spacewalk last week, she realized a medium was a better fit and decided to put safety first. As Nasa spokeswoman, Stephanie Schierholz, said “In this case, it’s easier (and faster!) to change space-walkers than reconfigure the spacesuit.”
Although this is disappointing news, being an astronaut is an extremely technical and dangerous job, and one wrong element could lead to disastrous results. However, this brings to light the lack of women in the spacewalk missions, and the change that the NASA program has yet to undergo.
One statistic I found particularly alarming is “More than 500 people have been into space, but only 11% have been women”. But, “Koch and McClain were both part of Nasa’s 2013 class, which was 50% female”. Let’s go girls!