One giant leap for womankind called off

First all-female spacewalk is cancelled after agency realises that ISS has only large or extra-large outfits

Nasa has cancelled its first ever all-female spacewalk outside the International Space Station after it emerged it did not have enough suits to fit women. In a blow to what would have been one giant leap for womankind, the plan for Christina Koch and Anne Mcclain to change a battery outside had to be called off. Both required a medium-sized spacesuit, but the station only has one because most of the male astronauts rely on large or extra-large sizes.

James Rothwell

Otto Lanzavecchia

NASA has cancelled its first ever allfemale spacewalk outside the International Space Station after it emerged it did not have enough suits to fit women.

In a blow to what would have been one giant leap for womankind, the plan for Christina Koch and Anne Mcclain to change a battery on the exterior of the ISS had to be called off.

Both astronauts required a medium sized spacesuit to carry out the walk, but the station only has one because most of the male astronauts rely on large or extra-large sizes.

As a result, Nasa said Ms Mcclain would have to give up her place.

The news has reignited the debate about whether the traditionally maledominated space industry is unconsciously biased against female workers.

Nasa said it had postponed Ms Mcclain’s spacewalk “due in part to spacesuit availability on the station”.

“Koch had been scheduled to conduct this spacewalk with astronaut Mcclain, in what would have been the first all-female spacewalk,” it said.

“Mcclain learned during her first spacewalk that a medium-size hard upper torso – essentially the shirt of the spacesuit – fits her best. Because only one medium-size torso can be made ready by [this] Friday, Koch will wear it.” Ms Mcclain is expected to do her spacewalk on April 8, which means the plan for an all-female spacewalk has fallen through. Senior figures in the space industry said they were disappointed, but pointed out that Nasa had taken a number of steps to bring in more female astronauts.

“It is a shame that we won’t see the first all-female spacewalk this week, but the bigger disappointment is that in 20 years of humans living on the ISS, it hadn’t already happened,” said Kate Arkless Gray, programme lead at the Frontier Development Lab Europe.

She pointed out that Ms Mcclain and Ms Koch are from Nasa’s 2013 intake, which had a 50-50 gender split.

“Nasa has been doing some good work to encourage women in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics), including proactively changing the language used to talk about space flight,” she said.

Nasa has also encouraged workers to avoid gendered phrases such as a “manned spacecraft” in favour of a “crewed spacecraft”. “It may seem like a small thing, but it’s something that we can all do to ensure that women feel like space is for them too,” said Ms Arkless Gray.

♦ Vice-president Mike Pence has announced that the United States aims to send astronauts back to the Moon in five years, with a woman first in line to set foot on it again. He said: “Let me be clear, the first woman and the next man on the moon will both be American astronauts launched by American rockets from American soil.”