Musk shares picture of new space suits designed by SpaceX
09 Sep 2017
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has shared another picture of his company's new space suits, which show a full-body shot of what the outfit will look like. The Instagram shared image shows a person wearing wearing the suit while standing next to a Crew Dragon capsule, the vehicle under construction at SpaceX to take NASA astronauts to and from the International Space Station for the agency's Commercial Crew Program.
According to commentators, it offered the second glimpse of SpaceX's space suit that Musk gave fans in the last couple of weeks. In the first picture only the suit from the torso upward was seen, but the image revealed the design of both the gloves and the boots, as also the padding used for the pants.
The suits designed by SpaceX are pressure suits, meant to be worn while riding inside the Crew Dragon. The suits are needed primarily in case of an emergency scenario during flight; if the spacecraft were to suddenly depressurise. The suits will keep the astronauts alive until they can get to safety.
Musk has promised to release more information about the suits in the ''days to come,'' but very few specifics are known currently.
Musk captioned the photo with the words, ''Astronaut spacesuit next to Crew Dragon.''
The brain behind the design of the spacesuit is said to be Marvel and DC movie legend Jose Fernandez.
''I didn't know what SpaceX was and I thought it was a film,'' Fernandez previously told Newsweek about the request from Elon Musk's space travel company.
Musk and SpaceX fans are wondering whether it actually works. Musk had earlier indicated that the suit can work and it was not a mock-up.
He further admitted that it was 'incredibly hard' to balance the look and its function when he first revealed what the top of the spacesuit looked like on Instagram in August.
