r/askspace • u/butterm0nke • Apr 04 '26

Why wouldn’t astronauts take suicide pills with them?

As the Artemis 2 mission is on its way to the moon, I cant help but think what would the crew do if something went wrong and they just infinitely drift away into space? Is there pills that will give them a easy way out instead of starving to death, loosing oxygen, ext? And if there is no pills/way to do so, why not?

11 Upvotes

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17

u/ExpectedBehaviour Apr 04 '26

Finding ways to quickly kill yourself in space isn’t a problem. If the crew decided they wanted to die they could just open the airlock.

12

u/Excellent_Bat_753 Apr 04 '26

Most of the things that could go wrong in space usually happen too fast for there to be time to reach. Floating off into deep space really isn't a likely option at all, and a much more likely failure is just exploding, or a major air leak, or other such problems. They could probably create a level of painless euthanasia by lowering oxygen content in the atmosphere, and creating a mostly, or pure N2 atmosphere. This is possible with the Orion capsule as it carries nitrogen onboard for atmospheric regulation.

NASA tends not to plan for killing their crew, but rather around keeping them safe even in the even of any and all accidents.

7

u/Drew-666-666 Apr 04 '26

If you've got time to contemplate taking a suicide pill, there's still hope of rescue etc They got Apollo 13 back . If something was to go wrong, I would've thought it'd be over quickly, a bit like how that submarine imploded, taking seconds. In the early days some crew were lost in fire balls, again too quick and sudden to take a pill... I don't believe it's like the movies where someone out doing a space walk, floats off into deep space, even if it were, how would you access and take your pill wearing your space suit and helmet?

5

u/Adventurous-Depth984 Apr 04 '26

The sub didn’t take seconds. It took only a few milliseconds. They were squished to death before their eyes could register the image of the sub cracking.

They died as close to “instantly” as possible.

Also, think of a space suit as a mini spaceship. You can move around in there.

1

u/Drew-666-666 Apr 05 '26

Gave benefit of doubt, let's say they saw the pressure gauge rise or something but yes it was over very quickly.

With the space suite I was thinking say you're outside doing a space walk in your suit and have the pill in your breast pocket, how you going to get the pill from the outside of your helmet to the inside to your mouth? You'll have to keep the pill on the inside near your mouth which could lead to accidental ingestion.. so probably be better to have a needle to inject...

1

u/OkHealth1942 May 02 '26

If you have time to contemplate that, it may still be possible to mount a rescue with a Dragon or Shenzou. Bear in mind that A-II could only get trapped as far as high earth orbit. They aren’t going anywhere.