Quest Joint Airlock

Quest, also called the Joint Airlock Module or JAM, is the pressurized airlock of the International Space Station. It is built as two cylindrical chambers joined end to end by a connecting bulkhead and hatch, and it stores and prepares the spacesuit hardware that crews use for spacewalks. Once activated it became the main route for station spacewalk entry and exit for American Extravehicular Mobility Units, and it is also designed to work with the Russian Orlan suit. Quest is 5.5 meters long and 4 meters across, has a mass of 6,064 kilograms and holds 34 cubic meters. Because crews can leave and return without venting the whole station, spacewalks no longer cost large amounts of air and other consumables. The module was launched on 12 July 2001 in the payload bay of the space shuttle Atlantis on STS-104 and attached to the station on 15 July 2001. It is a NASA element with Boeing listed as its contractor.