Apollo 13: 5. Life support
13 Minutes Presents: The Space Shuttle
00:00
The Lunar Module's Life Support System Isn't Up to the Job
In a spacecraft, everything you exhale stays inside the cabin. And unless you can find a way of removing the carbon dioxide, or CO2, it builds up. High concentrations its poisonous, leading to coma and eventually death. The system depended on simple chemistry. But now that all three astronauts are crammed inside and set to stay there for several days, the lunar module's life support system is not going to be up to the task. It will run out long before they get back to Earth.
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