The first commercial spacewalk will take place this week. The spacewalk is part of the Polaris Dawn mission—a five-day commercial mission to push the limits of commercial space travel exponentially. The event is set to take place on the crew’s third day in space, Thursday, September 12.
During the spacewalk, Polaris Dawn’s crew will be protected only by SpaceX’s new Extravehicular Activity (EVA) suits. SpaceX designed these new suits in just two and a half years, which is extremely fast compared to how long it has taken NASA to replace its own aging spacesuits.
The team aboard the Polaris Dawn mission is doing some interesting things to test different ways to mitigate certain risks to their spacewalk, too. Not only will the first commercial spacewalk set a precedence for how these continue on, but it’ll also give astronauts more ideas for how to conduct these types of missions going forward.’
More specifically, the crew aboard the Crew Dragon capsule will lower the pressure inside the capsule and then put on their spacesuits just after the capsule hits the ambient pressure of the suits. This will hopefully help cut down on unwanted bubbles.
Of course, the biggest issue the team will face is getting the pressure inside the capsule back to normal after they return from the spacewalk and close the hatch. If they aren’t able to restore pressure, the return trip to Earth could be very dangerous.
Making changes to how we operate in space is always going to come with risks, though. In fact, some SpaceX advisors saw we should absolutely be nervous about this mission, because this is the first time something like this is being tried. Considering the overall risks that going to space already brings, it’s imperative that this mission goes the way SpaceX plans.
