12/10/07 -- The price has yet to be confirmed, but the first space suit aimed at the general public has enjoyed its debut fashion show. The designer, Chris Gilman, officially launched the suit at the X Prize Cup 2007 - a space innovation competition held every year at the Halloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. So will we now see tourists clad in space suits as they holiday in the Great Outer Space?

The current plan is not quite so ambitious. As the name would suggest, flight costume IS3C (Industrial Suborbital Space Suit Crew), is not designed to take wealthy tourists into outer space, but rather to merely let them briefly experience the joys of weightlessness.

At the moment the 'Suborbital' flight market, offering passengers the chance to step aboard a rocket and fly at 100km (62.14 miles) altitude is only within reach of a few private entrepeneurs. It's a project Virgin Galactic has been investing in for many years. The company, a division of the Virgin Group, has put the cost of a ticket at around 300,000 euros (approx £210,000) and estimates a potential 7000 to 15000 clients between 2008 and 2013.

However, you do not need to be one of the big players to experience flight at a 'mere' 100km altitude. The traditional space suit, which weighs more than 100kg (220 pounds), has ten consecutive built-in layers, is laden with plastic tubing and can withstand attacks from micro-meteorites or temperatures ranging from 120 to -150 degrees, will remain the domain of astronauts. Yet the vessel that will be used to carry tourists will still be exposed to depressurisation.

So for tourists, as for the NASA professionals, a specialised suit is therefore required. Orbital Outfitters, specialists in flight wear and owners of the IS3C, stress that the suit has to be as particular as those who will wear it. "To be not only safe but elegant".

This is perhaps the reason why Chris Gilman, who has also designed a variety of space costumes for Sci-Fi films, decided to give the suit a more retro, as opposed to futuristic, look. The designer, who won a technical Oscar for his thermally regulated underwear, has given just as much time and devotion to his latest design.

One final point: the outermost layer of the suit can be 'customised' as desired by future space flight operators.

[Full Article]

By Catherine Vincent

--Translated by Natalie Jennings

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