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Comment by jevinskie | Hacker News Reader

Drowning in a spacesuit? Not how I'd imagine going out. How would a snorkel help given that there is no true waterline in weightlessness?

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The snorkel just has to go somewhere other than the helmet area where the water is leaking. I read that it goes down near the chest. This assumes, of course, that their isn't enough water to fill the entire suit.

That made me wonder what the procedures are if one was to die on the ISS. You'd have to store the remains somewhere until the next Soyuz ship can launch? That's probably enough morbid thinking for today.

Knowing how NASA operates, it's very likely they have a detailed document outlining procedures.

I remember reading the Space Shuttle specification and there were contingencies for abort at various stages and if an incident happened what to do about it.

Contingencies for abort at various stages isn't all that unusual or interesting. Heck, I do that before I go fly my 600lb glider.

I don't doubt that they have contingencies for deaths on board, though. I'm sure everything has a plan. Sort of the space equivalent of the US military having plans to invade Canada and Mexico, except more likely to be needed.

They wouldn't wait, they'd preform an emergency re-entry on one of the Soyuz (there's normally two docked these days). Even if there was only one Soyuz the ISS can run automatically with the MCC controlling all functions for a while.

It'd be a bit silly if they have to send a soyuz up to fetch the astronauts in case of an emergency. There's currently 2 soyuz capsuled docked to the station, they can leave on a pretty short notice, I'd imagine they'd do so in the event of a death.

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