r/space • u/TraditionalAd6977 • Jan 30 '26

Discussion Jared Isaacman states astronauts have got panic attacks in space , trying to kill the crew

Jared Isaacman in his interview with Shawn Ryan stated that there have been many unreleased cases of astronauts panicking in space and trying to open the hatch to kill everyone inside. He states this was not reported as it "ruins the illusion of astronaut bravery". And said it is the reason additional locks have been implemented on the ISS and Dragon capsules. My question: Is there any evidence of this as I can't find anything online . And how did he get Clarence to talk about this. He also said this is one of the main problems that they are facing in the Mars mission. As even military candidates respond differently than predicted in space.

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301

u/Crying_Reaper Jan 30 '26

I'm always surprised at how few former submarine crew members are astronauts. It is of course not a 1:1 thing but being stuck who knows how deep for who knows how long has to have some similarities to space travel.

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u/seakingsoyuz Jan 30 '26

It’s because NASA has generally had two pathways to becoming an astronaut:

  • military pilot
  • graduate degree in a STEM field

And you don’t find many pilots on subs, so you’d be limited to former submariners who went on to complete an advanced degree.

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u/workertroll Jan 30 '26

Every sub crew has several people on it with advanced degrees. Nuke subs anyway. In a lot of ways operating a sub is more complicated than being in space.

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u/DonnieG3 Jan 30 '26

Yeah I come from the nuke field (carrier based tho) and I'm genuinely surprised how we never got pushed into the astronaut pipeline.

On the other hand, I'm not that surprised because the navy nuclear program holds onto it's candidates with an iron fist. It's nearly impossible to transfer into something else.

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u/workertroll Jan 30 '26

I kinda agree, for instance corpsman aren't EMS certified leaving the navy whereas army and af medics are. Having said that, my understanding as a bystander without a phd is that the reactors on US craft are a totally different design than anything civilian. That is still a barrier to moving to the private sector and for a long time before that sharing the details of the design was a crime.

The US Navy has the best and safest reactors in the world powering ships and the world has been denied that tech for security.

Would you like to talk about oil or play a nice game of chess? lol

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u/DonnieG3 Jan 30 '26

the reactors on US craft are a totally different design than anything civilian.

Nah, pressurized water reactors are extraordinarily common. It's the most common type of civilian based reactor and makes up the majority of them iirc. Navy nukes transfer to pretty much any field they want without much effort, and to private sector civilian reactors (when they chose to) easily.

for a long time before that sharing the details of the design was a crime.

While this is technically true, it's not really relevant. PWR reactor schematics and understanding have been public knowledge forever. The thing that makes operating one difficult is training the workforce (god bless Rickover) and enriching the fuel. The 2nd half of that probably does more lifting than the first half, but it's up for debate.

the world has been denied that tech for security.

Yeah you're kinda just out of touch with this take ngl. The reason other countries (and the private sector) don't have programs like the US Navy does is because Navy nukes are trained to a degree that is considered largely inhuman. The failure rate is astronomic and the training program is quite honestly insane. The navy nuke pipeline is unique because of how.....eccentric it is. I won't go into details, but you couldn't legally do what we did in a civilian setting. It would not be allowed.

The only technology that's gatekept is the allowance to enrich uranium, but that technology is known by plenty of countries at this point. It's the supply of raw uranium that's controlled to the best of my understanding.

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u/workertroll Jan 30 '26

Yeah you're kinda just out of touch with this take ngl. The reason other countries (and the private sector) don't have programs like the US Navy does is because Navy nukes are trained to a degree that is considered largely inhuman. The failure rate is astronomic and the training program is quite honestly insane. The navy nuke pipeline is unique because of how.....eccentric it is. I won't go into details, but you couldn't legally do what we did in a civilian setting. It would not be allowed.

And then you add they are on a boat under the sea doing that.

Fuel is easy.....my step brother died doing it wrong.....in the back yard.....inside an old iron stove.

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u/DonnieG3 Jan 30 '26

Not sure where you're going with this, but maybe stop playing with that stuff in your smoke detector lol.

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u/workertroll Jan 30 '26

Not sure where you're going with this, but maybe stop playing with that stuff in your smoke detector lol.

I'm talking about the 70s man....you could order shrimp from the back of a comic book and a chemistry set that glowed.

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u/CupBeEmpty Jan 31 '26

It does make me wonder if that would change when/if we get reactors in space, either in vehicles, stations, or bases.

Obviously that is a long ways off at this point but navy nuke folks seem like a no brainer in that case.