Rosemary Coogan is surrounded by a team of people pushing, pulling, squishing and squeezing her into a spacesuit.It takes about 45 minutes to get all her gear on before a helmet is carefully lowered over her head.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The British astronaut is about to undergo her toughest challenge yet \u2013 assessing whether she is ready for a spacewalk. The test will take place in one of the largest pools in the world: Nasa\u2019s Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The pool \u2013 which is 12m deep (40ft) \u2013 contains a life-sized replica of the International Space Station (ISS), and a \u201cspacewalk\u201d here is as close as it gets to mimicking weightlessness on Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a big day,\u201d Rosemary says before the dive, which is going to last more than six hours. \u201cIt\u2019s very physically intense \u2013 and it\u2019s very psychologically intense.\u201d
But Rosemary doesn\u2019t seem too fazed. She smiles and waves as the platform she\u2019s standing on is slowly lowered into the water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Being an astronaut was Dr Rosemary Coogan\u2019s dream from a young age, she says. But it was a dream that seemed out of reach. \u201cAt the careers day at school, you don\u2019t tend to meet astronauts,\u201d Rosemary says. \u201cYou don\u2019t get to meet people who\u2019ve done it, you don\u2019t really get to hear their stories.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So she decided to study the stars instead, opting for a career in astrophysics. But when the European Space Agency (ESA) announced it was looking for new recruits to go to space, Rosemary applied and was chosen from more than 22,000 people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
ESA aims to get Rosemary to the International Space Station (ISS) by 2030. She\u2019ll be following in the footsteps of Britons Helen Sharman, who visited the Soviet\u2019s Mir Space Station in 1991, and Tim Peake who launched to the ISS in 2015.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rosemary has spent the last six months training at the Johnson Space Center. As well as exploring the outside of the submerged ISS, she can head inside the orbiting lab in another life-sized mock-up located in a huge hangar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She takes us on a tour of the lab\u2019s interconnected modules. It feels very cramped, especially considering astronauts usually spend many months on board. But Rosemary reminds us about the spectacular views.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt is an isolated environment, but I think this helps to give that kind of connection to being outside \u2013 to alleviate that sense of claustrophobia.\u201d
Rosemary\u2019s training here covers every aspect of going to space – including learning how to use the onboard toilet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe lower part is where you put your solid waste,\u201d she says, pointing to a loo in a small cubicle that looks like something you might find at a very old campsite. \u201cAnd this funnel here is actually attached to an air suction system, and that is where you put your liquid waste.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Female astronauts have the option of suppressing their periods using drugs, Rosemary says, but can also opt not to. \u201cThere\u2019s essentially a filter that you put on top of the cone in which you urinate and it\u2019s to stop any particles, any blood, from going into the urine system.\u201d Urine needs to be kept separate because it\u2019s purified and treated to be re-used as drinking water, she explains. (BBC)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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