Astronaut Doi's Status Report

#1(November 23 CST) #2(November 27 CST) #3(November 28 CST) #4(December 2 CST)

Astronaut Doi's Status Report #1
(November 23 CST)

The EVA for this STS-87 mission has two objectives. One is to capture the SPARTAN satellite. The second is to evaluate various tools and a crane to be used for the International Space Station. Today I would like to talk about the spacesuits that we are going to use for this EVA.

On my right is Winston's spacesuit, and on my left is my spacesuit. The spacesuit is made up of four major parts. The first part is the helmet. You can see here a light attached to it. This enables us to work in the night, and in the daytime when it is too bright, we use this sunvisor as our "sunglass." Under the helmet is the torso. There are many tools attached to the torso from here, and on the back side you can see a back pack. Inside this back pack is a oxygen tank and other life support, environment control systems. Under the torso is the lower torso assembly where my legs fits in.

The last, but very important part is the gloves. KC is outside the airlock shooting this. KC, can you hand me the gloves? Thanks. In space, it's easy to hand over things like this. Now you can see that the gloves are two or three times as large as my hands. The wrist of the gloves fit into the torso like this.

The fingers of the gloves are very thick and hard, and it is difficult to move your fingers, so it is very important to find the gloves that fit you perfectly or else, you are going to have a very hard time doing your work. We also use many tools during our EVA. One of them is the power tool. KC, the power tool please - Thank you. Here is the power tool. We use this like a motor driver. The motor is in here, and the battery is here. I will use this to expand and retract the boom of the crane. The torque and the rotation speed is adjustable, so it will be very easy to open and close bolts.

Tomorrow, Winston and I will open the outer hatch of the airlock behind me, and will step out into space for a six hour and a half EVA. We are prepared and looking forward to it. Please expect a great EVA!

Last Updated : December 2, 1997