NASA is exploring whether SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft can potentially provide an alternative experience property for some crew associates of the International Space Station just after a Russian capsule sprang a coolant leak although docked to the orbital lab.
NASA and Russia’s house company, Roscosmos, are investigating the induce of a punctured coolant line on an external radiator of Russia’s Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft, which is intended to return its crew of two cosmonauts and 1 U.S. astronaut to Earth early next 12 months.
But the Dec. 14 leak, which emptied the Soyuz of a vital fluid employed to control crew cabin temperatures, has derailed Russia’s room station routines, with engineers in Moscow examining no matter if to launch another Soyuz to retrieve the 3-person staff that flew to ISS aboard the crippled MS-22 craft.
If Russia can not launch yet another Soyuz ship, or decides for some reason that performing so would be as well risky, NASA is weighing another alternative.
“We have asked SpaceX a several thoughts on their capability to return supplemental crew users on Dragon, if vital, but that is not our key aim at this time,” NASA spokesperson Sandra Jones reported in a assertion to Reuters.
SpaceX did not answer to a Reuters request for comment.
It was unclear what NASA especially questioned of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon abilities, these types of as no matter if the business can obtain a way to enhance the crew capacity of the Dragon at present docked to the station, or start an vacant capsule for the crew’s rescue.
But the company’s likely involvement in a mission led by Russia underscores the degree of precaution NASA is getting to ensure its astronauts can safely return to Earth, must just one of the other contingency programs arranged by Russia drop by.
The leaky Soyuz capsule ferried U.S. astronaut Frank Rubio and cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitri Petelin to the space station in September for a 6-thirty day period mission. They were scheduled to return in March 2023.
The station’s 4 other crew associates — two far more from NASA, a 3rd Russian cosmonaut and a Japanese astronaut — arrived in October via a NASA-contracted SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, which also remains parked at the ISS.
SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule, a gumdrop-formed pod with four astronaut seats, has turn out to be the centerpiece to NASA’s human spaceflight attempts in minimal-Earth orbit. Apart from Russia’s Soyuz program, it is the only entity able of ferrying human beings to the space station and back.
3 feasible culprits
Discovering what brought about the leak could component into decisions about the ideal way to return the crew associates. A meteoroid-caused puncture, a strike from a piece of area particles or a hardware failure on the Soyuz capsule itself are a few probable causes of the leak that NASA and Roscosmos are investigating.
A components malfunction could raise supplemental concerns for Roscosmos about the integrity of other Soyuz cars, these types of as the just one it may possibly send out for the crew’s rescue, mentioned Mike Suffredini, who led NASA’s ISS application for a 10 years until finally 2015.
“I can guarantee you that is some thing they’re wanting at, to see what is back there and no matter if you can find a issue for it,” he mentioned. “The issue about the Russians is they’re definitely superior at not talking about what they’re undertaking, but they’re really thorough.”
Roscosmos chief Yuri Borisov experienced beforehand said engineers would choose by Tuesday how to return the crew to Earth, but the company said that day it would make the selection in January.
NASA has beforehand said the capsule’s temperatures remain “inside of satisfactory restrictions,” with its crew compartment at the moment currently being vented with air movement permitted by means of an open up hatch to the ISS.
Sergei Krikalev, Russia’s main of crewed area applications, explained to reporters previous 7 days that the temperature would increase rapidly if the hatch to the station had been closed.
NASA and Roscosmos are mainly concentrating on deciding the leak’s trigger, Jones stated, as nicely as the overall health of MS-22 which is also meant to provide as the 3-gentleman crew’s lifeboat in situation an unexpected emergency on the station requires evacuation.
A modern meteor shower at first appeared to raise the odds of a micrometeoroid strike as the offender, but the leak was facing the incorrect way for that to be the situation, NASA’s ISS program manager Joel Montalbano informed reporters very last 7 days, however a space rock could have come from a different course.
And if a piece of room debris is to blame, it could gasoline fears of an progressively messy orbital natural environment and increase inquiries about regardless of whether this kind of critical equipment as the spacecraft’s coolant line really should have been safeguarded by particles shielding, as other parts of the MS-22 spacecraft are.
“We are not shielded versus all the things all through the house station,” Suffredini mentioned. “We are not able to protect against everything.”
