How do you poop in space?

Me and my daughter we talking today about the ISS, and we found ourselves wondering..How do you poop in space?
Obviously its not going to plop into a toilet like it would on earth,and suction is out of the question,as that would be,deadly...So our question stands. . . How do you POOP in space?

Seriously.We really want to know the answer.

BM

answer... very carefully!

www.examiner.com...


noticed your initials are BM

[edit on 8-4-2010 by berkeleygal]

Originally posted by berkeleygal
answer... very carefully!

crap, crap
u beat me to it

I have often wondered that myself
I think they have apparatus that is
specifically designed for #1 & #2.

Now question is

can u ONLY do 1 at a time???
hahaha

In space, no one can hear you parp

'They go where no man has gone before'

This is a cute thread. Actually i live in Houston, texas and have been to NASA many times. They have a mockup of a shuttle there and they do a little presentation where they explain some of the features and one of them is the toilet. It is a special toilet made for the astronauts with a hose and a cup type thing for them to pee into as well as handles that come over your legs to hold you onto it in zerop gravity. There is a bag that goes into the seat/cannister thing and after each use the bag is plunged down and compressed intot he cannister and after the astronaut takes his turn he replaces the bag for the next person. The urine is ejected into space where it vaporizes. The cannisters can hold up to so many bags and then a new cannister is placed. the old system i think was a all in one thing where everyones poop went into one container and was good for 14 days worth of poop.
You can research all this on the nasa website. I only remember this cause my 9 year old who just loves him some potty humor made a big thing about the toilet during the presentation that day.LOL


editing this post cause i obviously cant spell astronauts right. (astronaughts) lol


[edit on 8-4-2010 by fizzy1]

VERY CAREFULLY!!! ATS is fun tonight it must be somehting in the water?

It seems a little skill is necessary for a precision launch.



Source www.examiner.com...

A toilet seat sits atop a collection hose with a small opening above it. The opening, once the hatch slides back, is only about four inches in diameter. Working in weightlessness, without the benefits of gravity, the astronaut has to, shall we say, deliver a payload with precision accuracy.

Without floating off the seat.

To that end, astronauts must use special thigh clamps and body restraints to keep them held in the proper position. As Mullane explains, getting into exactly the right position takes a lot of training back on Earth.

If the astronaut isn't positioned correctly over the vacuum of the toilet, solid waste could get smeared on the toilet and the astronaut. In a worse-case scenario, some might escape and start floating around the space vehicle.

As part of pre-flight training at Johnson Space Center, Mullane says, astronauts used a duplicate of the shuttle toilet. Even though they have the benefit of gravity, they still had to learn precision positioning.

"To help the astronauts.....NASA installed a camera at the bottom of the toilet simulator transport tube. A light inside the trainer provided illumination toa part of the body that normally didn't get a lot of sunshine. A monitor was placed directly in front of the trainer with a helpful crosshair marker to designate the exact center of the transport tube. In our training we would clamp ourselves to this toilet and wiggle around until we were looking at a perfect bull's-eye. When that was achieved, we would memorize the position of our thighs and buttocks in relation to the clamps and other seat landmarks," Mullane wrote.

There are stories about astronauts marking their thighs to remind them exactly where the clamps were supposed to fit. Astronauts are known for being perfectionists, and this is one space chore that truly requires absolute perfection in targeting.

Mod Edit: Added external source tags.

[edit on 8-4-2010 by Gemwolf]

rolling on floor


2nd line
laughing my unsunny spot off

wow I always thought they wore diapers like that crazy astronaut stalker chick in the news a few years ago

but I'd just try and hold it in

The Poop tube.

video.google.com...#

For everyone else - they create a vacuum.

I heard it doesn't take much effort!

You hang your trunk out the window and the vaccum just sucks it straight out!
You gotta be prepared to catch your insides though!

[edit on 8/4/10 by spearhead]

reply to post by baddmove

I can't believe it. I can't believe someone posted a thread about this. I just can't...

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/55a2f697ce81.png[/atsimg]

Man, AT LEAST you could have done a question like "What if NASA is using alien technology to dematerialize or processing stools???" You know... you are talking about poop, so for sake, put some glamor on it...

Tnks by this disgusting subject!!

[edit on 8-4-2010 by ucalien]

No idea. But I'm sure they take a wizz just like they do on earth when you can't find a toilet or a tree.

Use a bottle then chuck it out the window.

reply to post by Holist1c


yeah Diarrhea must be the worst case scenario, man that would suck!

and suction is out of the question

Nope, it's not... that's EXACTLY how it works....

like this

reply to post by fizzy1


I was gonna say I have bet it had to do with suction. Why not like an airplane and just dispense it into space?


legit question btw


I bought a book once on how to poop in the woods.