23. What temperature extremes can an astronaut survive in a spacesuit? (A K2S Question)

From The Space Library

According to Grant Bue, a thermal engineer at the Johnson Space Center, the hottest predicted environment for the Shuttle is 220° F for a full payload bay pointed at the Sun. This would imply about a 180° F suit exterior. The crew person can't stay in this environment for long, maybe an hour, before the gloves get too hot. EVA's would be limited to about an hour in these conditions and would be avoided if possible. On the cold side we get environments as cold as -200° F on orbit in the extreme. Without heated gloves in this environment, the hands would freeze in a couple of hours. Astronaut, scientist and physician Story Musgrave got frostbite on several of his fingers working for many hours without heaters in a -130° F chamber test some years ago. In the -200° F temperatures, the protective visor of the helmet, the pane of lexan that protects the pressure bubble, embrittles within about 10 minutes, losing most of its protective function. Deep craters at the lunar pole, places that have never seen sunlight and are thought to contain highly valuable ice, are at a constant -388° F. Clearly, the suit would need to be redesigned in order to venture into these places.

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Answer provided by Lonnie Moffitt

Question and Answer extracted from the book Kids to Space - by Lonnie Schorer

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