WASHINGTON (AP) — The international space station's lone toilet is broken, leaving the crew with almost nowhere to go. So NASA may order an in-orbit plumbing service call when space shuttle Discovery visits next week.
Until then, the three-man crew will have to make do with a jury-rigged system when they need to urinate.
While one of the crew was using the Russian-made toilet last week, the toilet motor fan stopped working, according to NASA. Since then, the liquid waste gathering part of the toilet has been working on-and-off. Fortunately, the solid waste collecting part is functioning normally. Russian officials don't know the cause of the problem and the crew has been unable to fix it.
The crew has used the toilet on the Soyuz return capsule, but it has a limited capacity. They are now are using a back-up bag-like collection system that can be connected to the broken toilet, according to NASA public affairs officials.
"Like any home anywhere the importance of having a working bathroom is obvious," NASA spokesman Allard Beutel said.
LOL, Pixel! dammson, maybe you should test your theroy and report back to us (ick!).
Can I repeat here the comment I heard from a NASA architect, that the original astronauts (I think Saturn 5 era) could actually watch their urine spray out into space, and said it was absolutely beautiful, like a million exploding stars?
those pics remind me of a fart collection device that I built when I was 8. I wanted to try to light my farts on fire without any of the reprecussions involved in a flame near my ass.
Anyways, I used a funnel, a 2-liter bottle and some fish tank tubing...
"Thomas Crapper (1836-1910) did exist and is credited with improving the functionality of the early flush toilet (or "water closet," as it was then called), but he did not, contrary to popular belief, invent the pseudo-eponymous bathroom appliance from scratch. Credit for that goes to 16th-century author Sir John Harrington, who not only came up with the idea but installed an early working prototype in the palace of Queen Elizabeth I, his godmother. The first patent for a flushing water closet was issued to Alexander Cummings in 1775, sixty years before Thomas Crapper was born.
The son of a Yorkshire steamboat captain, Tom Crapper's destiny was fixed when he was apprenticed to a master plumber at the age of 14. He owned his own plumbing shop in London by the time he was 25. Crapper was awarded nine patents for plumbing innovations during his lifetime, three of them consisting of improvements to the flushing water closet. Though he made his name as a sanitary engineer to blueboods, Crapper himself was lowborn and never knighted, so it's a mystery why storytellers consistently award him the title "Sir.""
why dont they just go(might need skill to accomplish)
in a bucket or something
and then jetison the poo and what not, when finished?
the ultimate flush.
and wouldnt it be cool if they trained a plumber
for space and sent him up there?
just drop your duece in space and call it a day....... less shit we have to put in the landfills on earth....it will eventually burn up somewhere and create a flying asteroid turd....... aka a super mr.hanky.....
Whenever I read of space stories, never have I come across anything that describes the toilet system there. Now then it crosses my mind that the space employees are human beings afterall and they need to respond to the call of nature just like the rest of us on Earth. This issue has gotten me all curious and interested to know more about how plumbing really works in space and where do all their wastes go to. It would be gross to know though if I should in any way find out that their wastes are actually released into space and falls down the skies as rain.
Sep 30, 13 12:24 am ·
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plumbing problems
Space station crew to NASA: Send plumber soon
WASHINGTON (AP) — The international space station's lone toilet is broken, leaving the crew with almost nowhere to go. So NASA may order an in-orbit plumbing service call when space shuttle Discovery visits next week.
Until then, the three-man crew will have to make do with a jury-rigged system when they need to urinate.
While one of the crew was using the Russian-made toilet last week, the toilet motor fan stopped working, according to NASA. Since then, the liquid waste gathering part of the toilet has been working on-and-off. Fortunately, the solid waste collecting part is functioning normally. Russian officials don't know the cause of the problem and the crew has been unable to fix it.
The crew has used the toilet on the Soyuz return capsule, but it has a limited capacity. They are now are using a back-up bag-like collection system that can be connected to the broken toilet, according to NASA public affairs officials.
"Like any home anywhere the importance of having a working bathroom is obvious," NASA spokesman Allard Beutel said.
most unfortunate
just piss in space....wtf........
not like it's going to harm anything
I want to be a space-contractor. My rocket would have fiberglass ladders and toolboxes all over it.
there is not vacuum working cryzko...nothing to take anything into space...ahh the absence of gravity
can't one of the astronauts create vacuum?...with their mouth
^ thats about as jury-rigged as you could get
LOL, Pixel! dammson, maybe you should test your theroy and report back to us (ick!).
Can I repeat here the comment I heard from a NASA architect, that the original astronauts (I think Saturn 5 era) could actually watch their urine spray out into space, and said it was absolutely beautiful, like a million exploding stars?
i had to poop in a drywall bucket on a jobsite once
if someone farts in space, does it make a smell?
any less jury-rigged than that will be called something else...
dammson
those pics remind me of a fart collection device that I built when I was 8. I wanted to try to light my farts on fire without any of the reprecussions involved in a flame near my ass.
Anyways, I used a funnel, a 2-liter bottle and some fish tank tubing...
it didnt work
Thomas Pee Crapper would be dissapointed in NASSA! Think he was the guy how invented the Toilet...(Serious).....he was an English Bloke.
2 astronauts 1 cup
"Thomas Crapper (1836-1910) did exist and is credited with improving the functionality of the early flush toilet (or "water closet," as it was then called), but he did not, contrary to popular belief, invent the pseudo-eponymous bathroom appliance from scratch. Credit for that goes to 16th-century author Sir John Harrington, who not only came up with the idea but installed an early working prototype in the palace of Queen Elizabeth I, his godmother. The first patent for a flushing water closet was issued to Alexander Cummings in 1775, sixty years before Thomas Crapper was born.
The son of a Yorkshire steamboat captain, Tom Crapper's destiny was fixed when he was apprenticed to a master plumber at the age of 14. He owned his own plumbing shop in London by the time he was 25. Crapper was awarded nine patents for plumbing innovations during his lifetime, three of them consisting of improvements to the flushing water closet. Though he made his name as a sanitary engineer to blueboods, Crapper himself was lowborn and never knighted, so it's a mystery why storytellers consistently award him the title "Sir.""
I would vote for Knighting Tom Crapper....Just think what he has done for mankind....a hell of alot more than Paul McCartney.
haha
true that snook_dude
why dont they just go(might need skill to accomplish)
in a bucket or something
and then jetison the poo and what not, when finished?
the ultimate flush.
and wouldnt it be cool if they trained a plumber
for space and sent him up there?
where is the vacuum pump? don't for get the hand holds for the action / reaction thing.
Phil another un-notable Being Branson...from Virgin Airlines....Knight Branson just doesn't have the ring of Sir Crapper!
just drop your duece in space and call it a day....... less shit we have to put in the landfills on earth....it will eventually burn up somewhere and create a flying asteroid turd....... aka a super mr.hanky.....
Whenever I read of space stories, never have I come across anything that describes the toilet system there. Now then it crosses my mind that the space employees are human beings afterall and they need to respond to the call of nature just like the rest of us on Earth. This issue has gotten me all curious and interested to know more about how plumbing really works in space and where do all their wastes go to. It would be gross to know though if I should in any way find out that their wastes are actually released into space and falls down the skies as rain.
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