NASA said Monday that the toilet aboard Artemis 2 remains operational, but the four astronauts flying the first privy ever to go beyond Earth orbit are still dealing with a stubborn problem: how to get stored urine out of Orion. Officials said the mission launched on April 1 and that the crew was still working through the venting trouble on April 7.
Rick Henfling said the toilet remained operational, but the challenge was evacuating the tank. He said the vent was a lot less than expected, and the crew was having to fall back on other methods besides the toilet. The update came on Tuesday afternoon, after astronauts had also reported an odd burning smell coming from the toilet.
The problem has drawn unusual attention because Artemis 2's toilet is the first privy ever to fly beyond Earth orbit. NASA's Apollo astronauts did not have a toilet on their lunar flights and used handheld bags instead, which gives this malfunction a sharper edge than a routine systems issue. This one is not a complete toilet failure. It is a problem with venting stored urine out into space.
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NASA had previously hypothesized that ice may be blocking the vent nozzle on Orion's exterior, so heaters were engaged and the spacecraft was tilted toward the sun in an effort to bake away the proposed ice. The latest theory is that a chemical reaction tied to wastewater treatment may be generating debris that is clogging a filter, though that has not been confirmed.
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That is the friction point in this Artemis toilet issue: the system can still function, but the team has not yet solved the part that matters most for managing waste on a long flight. Henfling said the mission team likely will not get concrete answers until they can examine Orion up close, which means the clearest explanation may have to wait until the spacecraft is back within reach.
