Ronn Blankenship wrote:
>
> At 11:16 PM 11/7/02, Jon Gabriel wrote:
>
> >Leo: "We spent millions of dollars developing a pen that could write in
> >space. Do you know what the Russians did?"
> >Josh: "Used a pencil?"
> >Leo: "Used a pencil."
> >~The West Wing~
>
> However, there was at least one good reason that NASA chose not to use
> pencils: the wood and graphite shavings generated by sharpening a pencil
> would float in the air in microgravity, (1) being breathed in by the
> astronauts and (2) perhaps getting into the electronic equipment and
> causing short circuits (graphite being a conductor) or sparks, which would
> have been fatal in the pure oxygen atmosphere used prior to the Apollo 1 fire.
OK, there's a way around *some* of those problems: use a mechanical
pencil.
But there would probably be graphie dust generated when the pencil was
used to write. Not as much as there would be with sharpening a wood
pencil, but still some. Would that be reduced by using a harder
graphite, maybe?
Julia
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