Wondering what they'll wear at liftoff and landing...
Let's look at the past, when flights became long enough.
The Gemini astronauts constantly wore spacesuits (except for GT7 when they wore special pressure suits).
The Soyuz cosmonauts wore a uniform (except when spacewalk was expected) until after Soyuz 11, when they started to wear the Sokol.
The Apollo astronauts wore a spacesuit at liftoff, everytime they had an operation like a docking or a spacewalk or a moonwalk, but only their white garment at landing (even after knowing about Soyuz 11).
The Shuttle red pressure suit takes a lot of room, for storage, I'm sure! Plus the fact they need spacesuits too for spacewalks. Somehow, isn't it a waste of time and place if both need to be taken for one astronaut? Why not have them wear a spacesuit from liftoff and eventually also at landing?
The Sokol has many qualities: it's lightweight, doesn't take a lot of room for storage. It's because it doesn't have a helmet but the fabric goes past the head, with the visor adapted to the suit.
The Sokol can protect an astronaut for 2 hours in a depressurized environment, but the astronaut cannot stand straight in it (he's got to bend forward).
I'm not sure that if they go through a very sudden decompression, they'd have the time to don their Sokol pressure suit, but that would also be impossible for the Apollo spacesuits or the Shuttle pressure suits.
But the Orlan spacesuit is interesting in that you get inside it from behind and close the suit's hatch behind you. It should be faster than the other pressure or spacesuits.
The thing is: are new kinds of spacesuits going to be designed for the CEV or are they going to be pressure suits PLUS spacesuits to take with them as well. It should be possible to find a compromise...Or even no pressure suits at all on either launch or landing. The only time they could have been useful was during the Soyuz 11 re-entry!
Even the Soyuz T10A aborted launch was too close to Earth for deadly decompression. About the Soyuz 18, I'm sure there never was a depressurization in the cabin.
The launch escape tower is a much better life savor than a pressure suit...but that's only an opinion..
Raoul
What will the astronauts wear aboard the CEV?
