WASHINGTON — NASA directed astronauts on the International Space Station to shelter in a Crew Dragon spacecraft after Russian cosmonauts planned to perform repairs the agency thought created “elevated risk” to the station.
In a statement late June 5, NASA described what led mission controllers in Houston earlier in the day to order the four members of Crew-12, along with NASA astronaut Chris Williams, who flew to the ISS on a Soyuz, to shelter in the Crew Dragon spacecraft docked to the station.
Shortly after 9 a.m. Eastern, capcom Ever Zavala called the station and instructed the crew to execute a procedure to establish a “safe haven” in the Dragon spacecraft. He told them not to get in their pressure suits first, adding they could do so later inside the capsule if needed.
Less than two hours later, controllers informed the astronauts they could exit the Dragon and soon resumed their normal work on the station.
In the statement, NASA said the decision to establish the safe haven in Dragon came from concerns about work cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikaev planned to do in PrK, a portion of the Zvezda service module that has suffered small air leaks for several years. The rate of those leaks increased earlier in the week while cosmonauts were working in the PrK, which serves as a vestibule between a docking port used by Progress cargo spacecraft and the rest of the station.
“Roscosmos made the decision to begin work toward a more extensive inspection and structural repair effort Friday morning,” NASA stated. “This revised approach involved cutting a bracket to better access an area identified as a possible leak source for further inspection, using a method that could have resulted in elevated risk to the structure in the area.”
That elevated risk, NASA said, led mission controllers to seek a “heightened safety posture” and ask astronauts to shelter in the Dragon while that work was in progress.
The cosmonauts ultimately did not perform that structural work in PrK, electing instead to take measurements. Roscosmos, in its own statement, said the cosmonauts applied sealant to one of two suspected leak areas while studying the other.
“NASA strongly supported that decision, and as a result, following that decision, Crew-12 and Williams ended their safe haven activities and returned to normal operations aboard the orbiting laboratory,” NASA stated.
The statement did not discuss future plans to address the PrK air leak. Earlier this year, NASA said that the leak appeared to have been resolved by repairs that involved applying sealant to parts of PrK that showed cracks or other evidence of leaks. However, NASA and Roscosmos had not identified the root cause of the leaks and disagreed on their severity.
“NASA will continue to work with our Russian counterparts, along with the rest of the international partners that support the space station, to assess and ensure a resolution to this matter,” the agency stated.
