Female Scientists React Before—and After—NASA’s All-Women Spacewalk Was Canceled

NASA’s much-anticipated first all-female spacewalk was canceled because of space suit sizing issues. BU scientists react before and after the milestone came to a halt. Photos by Cydney Scott.

Last week, the world came oh-so-close to seeing the first all-female spacewalk, but as it turns out, we earthlings will have to keep waiting to see that day.

NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Christina Koch were slated to perform maintenance on the International Space Station (ISS) during the much-anticipated spacewalk, scheduled for Friday, March 29, 2019. But the would-be historic milestone came to a halt earlier in the week after NASA announced that Koch will instead be conducting the spacewalk with a male astronaut, Nick Hague, because there were not enough equipped medium-size space suits aboard the ISS for both Koch and McClain to wear at the same time.

Aboard the ISS, in the final week leading up to the spacewalk, McClain and Koch, the two female astronauts currently on the space station, discovered they both would need to wear a medium-size space suit during their mission. While there are enough properly outfitted large and extra-large space suits on hand, only one medium-size suit aboard the ISS was properly configured for a spacewalk.

Even though the changes to the spacewalk were necessary to keep the team safe and on schedule, many people on social media expressed disappointment at the almost-historic moment, which would have coincided with the conclusion of women’s history month.

Anticipating the female spacewalk, BU Today had reached out to speak with BU women astronomers, engineers, and space scientists about the milestone. They were, to say the least, pretty excited about it. After the space suit snafu, we reached out again to see how their feelings had changed based on the updated spacewalker assignments. Here are their reactions, before and after the all-female spacewalk was no longer a thing.

Read more on BU Today.