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 Anastronaut training in the NBL | |
| Established | April 1995 (1995-04)[1] |
|---|---|
| Location | Houston,Texas,United States |
Operating agency | NASA |
| Website | www |
TheNeutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL) is anastronaut training facility andneutral buoyancy pool operated byNASA and located at theSonny Carter Training Facility, near theJohnson Space Center inHouston,Texas.[2] The NBL's main feature is a large indoor pool of water,[3] in which astronauts may perform simulatedEVA tasks in preparation for upcoming missions. Trainees wear suits designed to provideneutral buoyancy to simulate themicrogravity that astronauts experience duringspaceflight.
In the late 1980s NASA began to consider replacing its previous neutral-buoyancy training facility, theWeightless Environment Training Facility (WETF). The WETF, located at Johnson Space Center, had been successfully used to train astronauts for numerous missions, but its pool was too small to hold useful mock-ups of space station components of the sorts intended for the mootedSpace StationFreedom, or its successor, the International Space Station.
This new pool was going to be on Johnson Space Center property and was planned to be 72 meters (235 ft) by 41 meters (135 ft), with a depth of 18 meters (60 ft). To save money, it was downsized and placed inside an existing structure.
NASA purchased the structure that now holds the NBL fromMcDonnell Douglas in the early 1990s and began refitting it as a neutral-buoyancy training center in 1995.[4]
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The diving tank is 202 feet (62 m) in length, 102 feet (31 m) wide, and 40 feet (12 m) deep, and contains 6.2 million US gallons (23 million litres) of water.[5][6] The NBL contains full-scale mock-ups ofInternational Space Station (ISS) modules and payloads, as well as visiting vehicles such as theJapan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)HTV, theEuropean Space AgencyATV, theSpaceX Dragon, and theOrbital Sciences CorporationCygnus.[5] Full-scale mock-ups of equipment such as theSpace Shuttle payload bay and Hubble Space Telescope have been removed, as they are no longer needed for training.
The facility contains ahyperbaric chamber for treating any dive related emergencies, as well as analtitude chamber to simulate physiological effects of flying.
29°36′26″N95°08′38″W / 29.6071°N 95.1439°W /29.6071; -95.1439
