Hazardous Material Summary Tables (HMSTs)

Hazardous Material Summary Tables (HMST) are a compilation of the chemical, biological, and flammability hazards of materials during a given flight or mission. HMSTs are required by security for all programs, including but not limited to ISS, Commercial Crew Program (CCP), Multipurpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV), and Gateway. Toxicologists at Johnson Space Center (JSC) evaluate the toxic risk level of all liquids, gases, particles or gels transported on or to any U.S. manned spacecraft. Biosafety risk level and flammability levels are assigned by JSC microbiologists and materials experts and are documented in an HMST and in an in-flight computerized version of the HMST called the HazMat (hazardous materials) database.

“Requirements for the submission of data necessary for the toxicological evaluation of chemical and biological products to be carried on board manned spacecraft”

• JSC 27472 (PDF, 766 KB) defines the terms “chemicals” and “biological materials” as applied to items carried on or to any U.S. spacecraft. It explains who should submit information to JSC toxicologists regarding materials to be transported and specifies what information is needed. It provides schedules, formats and contact information.
• Additional US requirements for biological materials can be found on the Biosafety Review Board (BRB) page.
• Additional U.S. requirements for environmental control and life support (ECLS) assessments can be found in JSC 66869 (PDF, 698 KB).

For all flights to the ISS and all Artemis (Orion, Gateway, Human Lander System (HLS)) requests, please submit data via the Electronic Hazardous Material Summary Table Tool (eHMST). If you do not have access to this tool, please submit a NAMS request to access JSC – CMC external tools. Please refer to eHMST training for more information

NOTE: For payloads/experimental hardware planned for launch on a Russian vehicle, docked and/or operated on the Russian segment of the ISS, or planned for return or disposal on a Russian vehicle, we strongly encourage payload providers to submit biological and chemical data to the Russian Institute of Biomedical Problems (moukhamedieva@imbp.ru OR barantseva@imbp.ru).

Toxicological risk assessments are carried out in accordance with JSC 26895 – Guidelines for Toxic Risk Assessment of Spacecraft Testing Chemicals and Materials. The resulting Toxicity Risk Level (THL), in combination with the Biosafety Level (BSL) and Flammability Risk Level (FHL), forms the basis of the combined Hazard Response Level (HRL) used for labeling and operational response under Flight Rule B20-16.