There are a few examples of symbolism in Tom Godwin's "The Cold Equations." For example, at the beginning of the story, "the white hand of the tiny gauge" on the narrator's control panel symbolizes the rising tension of the story. The gauge indicates that there is a stowaway on board, and every time the narrator glances at it he knows, as do we, that he must reveal and then kill the stowaway. Indeed, he glances at "the telltale white hand" several times before finally revealing the stowaway, implying that he is trying to delay the obligation to kill that stowaway.

When the stowaway realizes that she must die, her face turns "white" and her lipstick stands out "like a blood-red cupid's bow." Godwin here uses color symbolism. The white symbolizes the girl's innocence, and the red symbolizes the danger she finds herself in.

Describing the girl's situation, Godwin writes that she:

had never known danger of death, had never known the environments where the lives of men could be as fragile and fleeting as sea foam tossed against a rocky shore.

In this simile, the sea foam symbolizes the fragility of human life in outer space, and the rocks symbolize the harsh conditions of outer space which make human life so fragile.