Space suits for Extra Vehicular Activities (EVA) are the key element for astronauts and cosmonauts to perform work outside a space station or a space vehicle.
The ‘EVA Suit 2000’ is a joint development of European and Russian companies initiated by the European Space Agency ESA and the Russian Space Agency RKA.
One of the major challenges in the development program is the design for in-orbit stay times of several years as the suit is to be equally usable during orbiter-based short-term missions as well as from a space station in a long-term mission.
Russian experience gained from present EVA suits on the MIR space station and European technologies for data handling and information management will be needed to achieve this goal.
This paper presents the current state of development activities for the suit which is to become operational by the end of this decade. It provides a description of the suit's main system aspects as well the major subsystems, such as suit enclosure, life support system and avionics.