Meaning & use
spacesuit
Last updated
Meanings
nouncountable
A sealed, pressurized garment that gives an astronaut air, warmth, and protection outside a spacecraft.
Grammar: Countable: one spacesuit, two spacesuits. Often written as two words, space suit.
Patterns
- wear a spacesuit
- put on a spacesuit
- a spacesuit for something
The astronaut struggled into her spacesuit before the spacewalk.
A spacesuit must keep out extreme heat and cold as well as supply oxygen.
Engineers tested the new spacesuit in a vacuum chamber.
nouncountable
A similar protective outfit worn for very cold or dangerous conditions on Earth, such as high-altitude flying.
Grammar: Countable; used for pressure suits in aviation or extreme environments.
Patterns
- a pressurized spacesuit
- a high-altitude spacesuit
Test pilots wear a kind of spacesuit when flying above 50,000 feet.
The rescue team wore insulated spacesuits to enter the frozen cave.
Word forms
| plural | spacesuits |
|---|
Common combinations
- wear a spacesuit
- Astronauts wear a spacesuit during launch and landing.
- put on a spacesuit
- It takes about an hour to put on a spacesuit.
- pressurized spacesuit
- The pressurized spacesuit protected him from the vacuum.
- spacesuit design
- Spacesuit design has improved greatly since the 1960s.
- inside a spacesuit
- The temperature inside a spacesuit is carefully controlled.
Synonyms and how they differ
- pressure suit
- A more technical term for a suit that maintains air pressure; spacesuit is the everyday word for the astronaut's outfit.
- flight suit
- A one-piece garment worn by pilots, but it is not sealed or pressurized like a spacesuit.
Word family
- space noun
- The region beyond Earth's atmosphere.
- spacecraft noun
- A vehicle designed for travel in space.
- spaceship noun
- A spacecraft, especially one carrying people.
Commonly confused: spacesuit or diving suit?
spacesuit vs diving suit
A diving suit protects a swimmer underwater; a spacesuit protects an astronaut in the vacuum of space.
Practice
The astronaut checked her ______ before leaving the airlock.
Choose one answer.
Spacesuit is the standard one-word spelling; space suit is also accepted but less common, while spacesuite and space-suit are not standard forms.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “spacesuit”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.