Constellation spacesuit system

Terry Hill once dreamed of being a pilot, but his ambitions have taken him beyond the friendly skies. Mr Hill is now fulfilling that dream working on the future of spaceflight for Nasa. He's helping to develop the next generation of spacesuits to send humans to the International Space Station, moon, Mars and beyond as part of Nasa's Constellation Programme.

"Never in a million years did I think I would be designing spacesuits for Nasa as my job," said Mr Hill, the engineering project manager for the Constellation Spacesuit System at the Nasa Johnson Space Centre.

Mr Hill worked on a variety of projects that provided the foundation necessary for his current position at JSC. One of those projects was the Orbital Space Plane. Hill gained valuable insight into the challenges of designing new vehicles to be compatible with the International Space Station. After OSP, Mr Hill worked on the STS-114 Return to Flight mission, developing and testing tile repair tools needed for the launch.

Constellation's mission includes building the next space fleet: the Orion crew capsule, the Ares I and Ares V launch vehicles, the Altair lunar lander and the spacesuits that interface with these vehicles and protect the crew in different, hazardous environments to allow them to accomplish mission objectives.

He leads the engineering team that is designing a single suit system capable of carrying out all aspects of those exploration missions.

The system will use interchangeable parts to minimize storage space and launch weight while maintaining the suit performance for the astronauts.

"Without the suit there is no manned mission," Mr Hill said. "We're working what we've learned from past programs like Apollo and Space Shuttle, and we were challenged by Constellation programme management to develop a one suit system to do it all."