By Meghan Bartels
Seven astronauts on the International Space Station were forced to take shelter in their transport spacecraft early Monday (Nov. 15) when the station passed uncomfortably closed to orbital debris, according to reports.
The space junk passes began in the pre-dawn hours of Monday and the International Space Station has continued to make close passes to the debris every 90 minutes or so, according to experts monitoring the situation. Russia’s space agency Roscosmos confirmed the space junk encounter with Space.com, though NASA has not yet commented on the situation either publicly or to Space.com.
“Thanks for a crazy but well-coordinated day, we really appreciated all the situational awareness you gave us,” NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei told NASA’s mission control at Johnson Space Center in Texas during a check-in marking the end of the astronauts’ day at about 12 p.m. EST (1700 GMT). “It was certainly a great way to bond as a crew, starting off our very first workday in space.”
“We’re looking forward to a calmer day tomorrow,” he said.
During the conversation, mission control told the crew that they were receiving a schedule for all the debris field passes that would occur through Tuesday (Nov. 16), although the ground support would stop announcing the passes to allow the crew to sleep. Mission control also noted that tomorrow, crewmembers would need to continue closing the hatches to modules off the core of the space station during passes.
By about 9:30 a.m. EST (1430 GMT), the situation aboard the space station had returned to normal, according to a statement from Roscosmos.
“Currently, the International Space Station crew is routinely performing operations according to the flight program,” the Roscosmos press office told Space.com in an email. “The orbit of the object, which forced the crew today to move into spacecraft according to standard procedures, has moved away from the ISS orbit, the station is in the green zone.”
Source: Space.com