Early this morning, NASA postponed a spacewalk scheduled to happen exterior the Worldwide Area Station at the moment, after getting phrase of a doable security menace from some close by area particles. It’s unclear the place the particles is coming from, however the delay comes about two weeks after Russia blew up one in every of its personal satellites in orbit, creating hundreds of harmful fragments that threatened the area station.
NASA astronauts Kayla Barron and Thomas Marshburn have been all set to don spacesuits and depart the confines of the ISS this morning at round 7:10AM ET, to be able to substitute an antenna on the surface of the station. It might have been the fifth spacewalk for Marshburn and the primary for Barron.
However earlier than they may depart by way of the airlock, NASA personnel in mission management stopped the spacewalk. “It’s simply actual life, that is how issues work out generally, and I’m actually glad you fellows are looking for our security,” Mark Vande Hei, one of many astronauts on board the ISS, informed flight controllers in mission management, in response to CBS Information.
In a brief weblog submit, NASA says that it didn’t have sufficient time to “correctly assess the danger” the particles posed to the astronauts, and so the company opted to postpone the spacewalk till additional discover.
It’s the second time within the final two weeks that area particles has upended plans on the Worldwide Area Station. On November fifteenth, the astronauts onboard the ISS have been woke up additional early by mission controllers and informed to shelter in place after Russia carried out an anti-satellite, or ASAT, check. Utilizing some form of kinetic missile, Russia blew up one in every of its personal satellites, creating no less than 1,700 items of trackable particles and hundreds of smaller items that can’t be tracked. Because the satellite tv for pc was orbiting comparatively near the ISS, the particles cloud periodically handed close to the ISS.
NASA didn’t say if the particles that postponed the spacewalk is from the identical ASAT check, and the area company didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. Nevertheless, NASA insinuated the delay is not going to have a big effect on the station. “The area station schedule and operations are capable of simply accommodate the delay of the spacewalk,” NASA wrote in its weblog submit.
