NASA directed astronauts aboard the International Space Station to take shelter in their spacecraft and be ready for a possible evacuation Friday as Russian cosmonauts worked to address a worsening air leak in the Russian segment of the orbiting laboratory.
The four astronauts of NASA’s Crew-12 mission aboard the station - two Americans, a French astronaut and a Russian cosmonaut - along with another U.S. astronaut, were ordered by NASA mission control at 9:04 a.m. ET (1304 GMT) on Friday to enter their SpaceX-built Crew Dragon spacecraft docked to the station, NASA spokesperson Bethany Stevens said.
They were instructed to don their spacesuits in case the air leak worsens and an emergency evacuation becomes necessary, Stevens said. NASA reversed the order roughly two hours later and told the astronauts they could return to the station as the agency and its Russian counterparts examined the rate of leaking air.
NASA and Russia's space agency Roscosmos, the station's two primary operators, have debated for months over the cause and potential fixes of small air leaks aboard Russia's Zvezda service module, a key structure of the ISS, a football field-size orbital laboratory where astronauts live and work in space. Roscosmos did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The air leaks have been relatively minor in recent months but escalated on Friday from a pound of air per day to two pounds, according to a senior NASA official who asked not to be named.
