Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Space
  3. News

ISS astronauts take delivery of a shiny new space toilet

Trevor Mogg
By

The International Space Station (ISS) received its latest delivery of food, tools, and experiments on Monday. It also included a brand new space toilet.

The cargo arrived on the Cygnus spacecraft after launching the previous day aboard Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket.

Recommended Videos

NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and Russian cosmonaut Ivan Vagner used the space station’s robotic arm to assist in the docking procedure 261 miles (420 km) above the South Pacific Ocean, with the procedure finishing at around 5 a.m. PT.

Related

Cygnus, which is also called SS Kalpana Chawla after the first astronaut of Indian origin launched to space but who sadly died in the 2003 Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, will stay docked at the ISS for the next three months.

Cassidy, Vagner, and the third space station inhabitant, Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin, wasted no time in unloading Cygnus, with Cassidy tweeting his delight at receiving some fresh edibles from the team back on Earth.

“The best thing about a cargo ship arriving is getting some fresh food,” Cassidy wrote a post that included several photos of what appeared to be apples and oranges.

With today’s food becoming tomorrow’s flushable waste, attention will inevitably turn to the brand new toilet that also arrived as part of the cargo. The so-called Universal Waste Management System (UWMS) was designed in response to feedback from astronauts, and so should provide a more comfortable experience when nature calls.

It is smaller and lighter than previous designs, and features improved integration with other components of the station’s water system that will help recycle more urine for astronauts to drink — though only after it’s been properly filtered and processed, of course.

In microgravity conditions, an Earth-like toilet experience could end messily. Space toilets therefore use airflow to pull urine and feces away from the body and into the proper receptacles. With the UWMS, the airflow automatically begins the moment the toilet lid is lifted, “which also helps with odor control,” NASA explains on its website. The new toilet also includes a more ergonomic design that needs less clean-up and maintenance time, and is built with more durable parts that should cut down on maintenance.

The space agency adds: “Less time spent on plumbing means more time for the crew to spend on science and other high-priority exploration-focused tasks.”

It’s not clear when the high-tech space toilet will be ready for its first visitor, but no doubt NASA will let us know when it happens. Though maybe we don’t need photos, Chris.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Trevor Mogg
Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
NASA confirms ISS will host cosmonauts through 2028
The International Space Station’s solar arrays provide power for the orbiting laboratory. NASA will install a total of six new roll out solar arrays in front of the existing arrays at 1A, 2B, 3A, 3B, 4A, and 4B to augment the power. During the Aug. 24 spacewalk, NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei and astronaut Akihiko Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will install the modification kit on the 4A power channel, where the next new roll out solar array will be installed in 2022.

The International Space Station (ISS) looked for a while like it was about to become a little less international when the Russian space agency chief suggested last year that his country would stop sending cosmonauts to the orbital outpost “after 2024.”

Roscosmos chief Yuri Borisov made the statement in July during a period of increasing tension between the U.S. and Russia following Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine five months earlier.

Read more
How to watch Friday’s historic spacewalk at the ISS
30 stunning spacewalk images to celebrate nasas 300th outing 26

NASA Live: Official Stream of NASA TV

NASA astronaut Steve Bowen and his United Arab Emirates counterpart Sultan Alneyadi are making final preparations for a spacewalk at the International Space Station (ISS) on Friday, April 28.

Read more
How NASA’s astronaut class of 1978 changed the face of space exploration
Sally Ride NASA

When you look back on the long history of crewed spaceflight, one group stands out for its radical challenge to the conventional wisdom of who could become an astronaut. NASA's astronaut class of 1978 saw not only its first women and people of color working as astronauts such as Sally Ride and Guy Bluford, but also the first Asian American astronaut, El Onizuka, the first Jewish American astronaut, Judy Resnik, and the first LGBT astronaut, once again Sally Ride.

A new book, The New Guys: The Historic Class of Astronauts That Broke Barriers and Changed the Face of Space Travel, chronicles the story of this class and its impact on both NASA and the wider world’s perceptions of who could be an astronaut. We spoke to the author, Meredith Bagby, about this remarkable group of people and how they changed the face of human spaceflight.
Breaking the mold
Throughout the 50s and 60s, NASA almost exclusively chose fighter pilots for its early human spaceflight program, Project Mercury. That meant that not only were astronaut groups like the famous Mercury Seven entirely composed of white men, but they also came from very similar military backgrounds.

Read more