Drowning in Space - ISS EVA #23

No one drowned in space, and the crew is fine but for a little while it was bit dicly.  Luca Parmitano, the first Italian to preform a spacewalk was on his second spacewalk of his career.  He report that there was some water on the back of his head.  The amount of water started to increase, and it moved to the front of his helmet and got into his mouth, nose, and eyes.  Luca was outside the ISS in his spacesuit with his EVA (extravehicular activity) crew-mate Chris Cassidy.  Both these guys are cool customers, Luca is a Major and former test pilot in the Italian Air Force who enjoys skydiving and SCUBA diving.  One thing to point out about Luca that in 2007, he was awarded the Medaglia al Valore Aeronautico d'Argento (Decoration for Aeronautical Valor in Silver) by the President of the Italian Republic, after safely landing his AMX in emergency due to a bird strike.  This was not Luca's first or last brush with death.  There is a reason he was selected as an astronaut.  His partner outside the space station was Commander (US Navy, not of the ISS) Chris Cassidy, the second Navy SEAL in space.  Chris is a combat veteran with 10 years of experience in the SEALS and two Bronze Stars for Valor during operations in Afghanistan.  While the FCT (Flight Control Team in Mission Control at Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX) talked with Luca with some troubling shooting steps to try to figure out where the water was coming from Chris chimed in, that it could be urine, right after Luca said he drank some.  This helped ease some of the tension in the FCR (Flight Control Room), even in space jokes about peeing are still funny.

NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy, Expedition 36 flight engineer takes a picture while outside the ISS for EVA 23 Photo Credit: NASA

 "ISS mission management team leader Kenneth Todd, joined by flight director David Korth and EVA officer Karina Eversley, confirmed the seriousness of the problem at an afternoon press conference. Korth noted that EVAs are already dangerous. For Parmitano, this experience was like plunging one's head into a sloshing fishbowl, with no way to get it off.

Eversley agreed that the choking hazard from inhaled water was real, and it eventually caused flight controllers to terminate the spacewalk. Todd said he was proud of the way the ISS team handled the near-emergency, one they had never encountered before. "The crew was cool and expert in reporting and diagnosing the problem. Our training on the ground paid off, and the team kept its eye on the main objective"—the crew's safety." From ISS Astronauts Have a Spacewalking Close Call - Popular Mechanics

For an idea of why this was dangerous look at this video Chris Hadfield, the first Canadian Commander of the ISS, made while he was up there.

Now image all that water on your face, it affects you seeing where to go, being able to talk on the radio, breathe, now it gets scary. 

There are two sources of water in a spacesuit other then urine (the diaper the astronauts wear should prevent this): the EMU (Extravehicular Mobility Unit, aka the spacesuit) cooling system that holds about 3.8 liters of water and the water drink bag which holds about 1 liter.  
In the earlier EVA# 22 when taking off Luca's suit it was reported there was a lot of water in this helmet, special steps were given to dry out the suit.  This water was believed to come from his drink bag.  The drink bag was found to be empty.  He was given a new drink bag to use on EVA #23. 

I would rule out the drink bag as the issue beacuse:
A. He was given a new one
B. It only hold about 1 liter of water, the crew reported 1 -1.5 liter of water in his helmet. 
C. He would have been drinking some water in the first hour of the spacewalk reducing the amount in his drink bag

The cooling system for the EMU seems to be the cause of the issue in my mind.  It holds 3.8 liters of water.  That's more than enough to have caused the flood in Parmitano's helmet, estimated at about 1 to 1.5 liters.  The cooling water moves from the heat exchanger to inside the suit onlong the astronauts skin via the Liquid Cooling Garment (LCG).  To cause this leak there has to be something wrong with the LCG or the connection that supplies the LCG. 

For those of you who were not spacesuit field test engineers here is something to help you understand how spacesuits work:

How NASA Spacesuits Work: EMUs Explained (Infographic)
by Karl Tate, Infographics Artist, Space.com

You can read the rest of the article HERE. 
To see the NASA press release go to This Website

Also now from NASATV see the coverage of the leak discussion:

Now the big question you are wondering where was I during all this excitement?  I was in MCC, not in FCR but one of the support rooms.  I was training on learning how to work the Bio-hardness, which the astronauts wear that get all their Bio data and send it to the ground for the Flight Surgeons.  The job which I was training for was to make sure all the bio data made it down to the ground, and trouble shoot any problems that arise.

For current process on finding the water leak issue the  very smart engineers and EVA operations personnel are still work on it.  I will let you know once they find out something.