America's National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has inflated a room for crew to use. The inflatable pod is an to the International Space Station (ISS). It is four metres long and 3.2 metres . It took three days to inflate. ISS crew members must wait a before entering it to check if it is . The blow-up is part of a test on the of inflatable accommodation in space, and of orbiting space hotels. The demo capsule cost $17.8 million. This initial test should lead to inflatable capsules at the space station.
The inflatable is the world's first blow-up capsule. It was designed and built by Bigelow Aerospace. The company's Robert Bigelow has spent years investing in and building hotels on Earth. He is working on a to build two space stations. These could be used as hotels in space by the of the . He said he could see inflatables as a big part of space travel and in the future. They are small enough to transport into space as airless units, but big enough and sturdy enough to live in, filled with air.
