The spacesuits used by NASA on the International Space Station (ISS) date back decades and are beginning to show their age. As a result, the space agency has devised a plan to rebuild its old spacesuits that will cost $3.5 billion.
Before 2026, NASA intends to have the set of new suits ready for usage on the ISS.
Aging Spacesuits
According to CNBC's report, NASA's spacesuits now in use on the ISS were first built in the '70s. These are suits that were developed for use in the space shuttle program. The agency continued fixing and maintaining them despite financial constraints for a very long time.
The director of the Human Spaceflight Laboratory at the University of North Dakota, Pablo De León, argues that the current suits have reached the end of their service life.
As NASA's astronaut corps becomes more diverse, it has struggled to obtain suits in the right sizes for everyone, and some of the components of those suits have worn out.
The $3.5-Billion Contract
Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace, a division of Raytheon Technologies, have been contracted by the government to design, manufacture, and maintain the new spacesuit fleet. As part of the Exploration Extravehicular Activity Services Contract or xEVAS, NASA will pay Axiom and Collins, along with a number of its commercial partners, up to $3.5 billion between now and 2034.
The first contract, worth $228.5 million, went to Axiom to design the suits that will be used during NASA's Artemis lunar missions. Meanwhile, the second, worth $97.2 million, went to Collins to design and create a new generation of suits for the ISS.
As Collins and Axion are providing their suits to NASA on a service basis, they are allowed to produce suits for clients other than NASA.
The specifications for these two outfits' functionality are almost identical, which is one of the many appealing aspects of this contract. In other words, "At any given time, we could ask either of those contractors to actually start working on the other what we call platform," as explained by Lara Kearney, manager of NASA's Extravehicular Activity and Human Surface Mobility Program.
"We also have what we call an on-ramp clause in the contract, which means if another company comes into play and they have the capability to compete, we can actually bring them on to the contract and allow them to compete on task orders as well," Kearney added.
Kearney said the ongoing competition provides incentives for the contractors to meet cost and schedule targets, which in turn reduces the government's outlay of money.
Collins Aerospace, in conjunction with ILC Dover and Oceaneering, is building a new suit, and CNBC was given an exclusive peek at the suit in its early stages of development.
