How flight suits have evolved to keep astronauts safe in space
Today’s high-tech spacesuit materials are a far cry from the cotton and rubber used by early high-altitude pilots.
This story appears in the July 2019 issue of National Geographic magazine.
Space suits—designed to provide oxygen and consistent atmospheric pressure—have evolved from pressure suits for pilots in high-altitude planes to ones that can keep astronauts alive in the near-vacuum conditions of space.
Read more about past—and future—travels to the moon in our July cover story “50 years after Apollo 11, a new moon race is on.”
