ISS Appears Normal After Capsule Leak

IOL/Reuters ^ | 1-13-2004 | Sona Oxley

[blam]

ISS appears normal after capsule leak

January 13 2004 at 04:06PM

By Reuters

By Sonia Oxley

Moscow - Air pressure has stabilised aboard the International Space Station (ISS) after astronauts found a tiny hole that probably caused the ISS to fall for three weeks, Russian and United States space officials said on Tuesday.

The orbital platform had been slowly losing pressure since December 22. On Monday, astronauts removed a hose in the window of a US onboard laboratory, which was the likely source of the leak.

"My understanding is that the air pressure levels have stabilised," Jim Newman, director of Nasa's Human Space Flight Programme in Russia, told Reuters by telephone.

'The orbital platform had been slowly losing pressure' "The leak appears not to be there. It's only been a day. We'll keep watching it."

Newman said it was between 90 and 95 percent definite the hole in the pipe had caused the leak. It was used to keep air and condensation out of the windows around the laboratory.

Russian officials, who insisted last week that air pressure levels had steadied, said it had increased slightly by Tuesday.

"On Tuesday it has already risen a little," Vyacheslav Mikhailichenko, spokesperson for Russian space agency Rosaviakosmos, said.

Officials said the leak posed no danger to the two-man crew, Nasa astronaut Michael Foale and Russian Alexander Kaleri. They will be sent a replacement hose when the next Progress cargo ship heads to the station on January 29.

The crew will press ahead with plans to seal off the four main modules and isolate the crew in one section as part of the pressure monitoring procedure, since it was still too early to tell whether the leak had been totally halted, Newman said.

"They are going to do that over the weekend," he said, explaining the procedure originally scheduled for Wednesday had been put back. "The astronauts will be in the service module, where the food and the potty are."

Officials said they still did not know what made the hole in the hose. "When it is brought back to earth, specialists will determine the cause," Mikhailichenko said.

A fresh crew will head for the station in mid-April to replace the current astronauts, aboard since October.

[blam]

Please correct the title to read 'Capsule.' Thanks.

[Lokibob]

 

You can see the steady decay of the orbit since the shuttle disaster.

 

 

---

ISS Height Profile

This plot shows the orbital height of the ISS over the last year. Clearly visible are the re-boosts which suddenly increase the height, and the gradual decay in between. The height is averaged over one orbit, and the gradual decrease is caused by atmospheric drag. As can be seen from the plot, the rate of descent is not constant and this variation is caused by changes in the density of the tenuous outer atmosphere due mainly to solar activity.

[silversky]

There are two reasons for the less frequent reboosts. To save fuel, which is now supplied only by the Progress ships and to lower the orbit so that the ISS is better protected by the Earth magnetic field. The Sun has been strangely hyper-active lately.

[Lokibob]

I'm aware of both of those reasons. They are far from being in danger, I just posted the graph as interesting info.


It seems to me that in 2001, the orbit was in the 450 Km range, but memory is a frail thing.