The International Space Station orbits Earth in October 2018. Photo credit: NASA
Late Monday evening, the Expedition 63 crew was awakened by air traffic controllers to continue fixing a small leak on the International Space Station that appeared to be getting bigger. The soil analysis of the modules tested overnight isolated the leak from the main work area of the Zvezda service module. Additional work is in progress to pinpoint the source of the leak.
At the current leak rate, the leak, which has been investigated for several weeks, does not represent an immediate danger to the crew and only a minor deviation from the crew’s schedule.
NASA Astronaut and station commander Chris Cassidy and Roscosmos cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner have been instructed to switch to the Russian segment to collect data from various locations in the Russian modules. The size of the leak identified overnight has since been traced back to a temporary change in temperature on board the station, with the overall leak rate remaining unchanged.
Previous leak tests were performed on the US, European and Japanese modules in the US segment of the station.
One by one, the crew closed the hatches between the aft and forward sections of Zvezda and the passageways from Zvezda to the Pirs Docking Compartment and the Poisk Module while collecting data using an ultrasonic leak detector. Throughout the night, US and Russian specialists took pressure measurements to try to isolate the source of the leak. After completing the overnight checks, the crew reopened hatches between the US and Russian segments and resumed regular activities.
The crew is preparing for the arrival of the unscrewed cargo ship Northrop Grumman Cygnus this weekend, due to launch from the agency’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Thursday evening, as well as the upcoming launch of the next trio of residents for the station. NASA astronauts Kate Rubins and cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov are at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, preparing for the complex’s launch on October 14th.
