NASA: Space station power system radiator leaking

Said to be serious but not life threatening. Seems like there are plans to work around.

Time for a repair mission, it would seem.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The International Space Station has a radiator leak in its power system. The outpost's commander calls the situation serious, but not life-threatening.

The six-member crew on Thursday noticed white flakes of ammonia leaking out of the station. Ammonia runs through multiple radiator loops to cool the station's power system. NASA said the leak is increasing from one previously leaking loop that can be bypassed if needed. NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs said engineers are working on rerouting electronics just in case the loop shuts down. The Earth-orbiting station has backup systems.

www.chron.com...

Howard Wolowitz is on the job!

reply to post by roadgravel


Sure its serious. Probably a 200 Million Dollar repair.

BUT,. .. If they would pull there heads out of their A$$es they would realize that if they took a handful of that Anit-Gravity Black Pepper and dumped it in the radiator and capped it off, the leak would stop almost Instantly.

It doesn't take a Rocket Scientist, .. . . Pun Intended.

hope they fix it quick, we do not want this going in the sea or in a populated area

Note that the crew is monitoring leak activity by watching ice crystals go by their windows. Who do you suppose will be the first to post new 'space UFO videos' on youtube?

Here's an article I wrote for 'Spectrum' almost three years ago explaining the new mode of space station repair EVAs -- like we just may see again in the near future.

spectrum.ieee.org...

This morning's story:
www.nasaspaceflight.com...

EVA tomorrow. That's FAST.

Looks like it is not the first leak.

Ammonia is used to cool the station’s power channels that provide electricity to station systems. Each solar array has its own independent cooling loop. This ammonia loop is the same one that spacewalkers attempted to troubleshoot a leak on during a spacewalk on Nov. 1, 2012. It is not yet known whether this increased ammonia flow is from the same leak, which at the time was not visible. It is anticipated that the 2B power channel, which is one of eight power channels to supply electricity for station systems, will be depleted of ammonia coolant by late this morning and will be shut down.

www.nasa.gov...

It seems that they are 'assessing' the situation.

Yea they'll assess it until the coolant is gone then they'll say 'We don't know where it's comming from.".
Instead of what you or I would do which is get out there and put some eyes on the leak.

When your car is leaking coolant you don't just stand back and guess. You open the hood and look at the hoses and radiator!

But what do I know. I just have to get by on a limited paycheck. Congress isn't going to fix my leaks.

More pollution by man into the pristineness that is space!

This ammonia will float off until it comes into contact with another planets atmosphere where it will start a chain reaction changing that planet for ever...ermm well that is what could happen. Hehe.

(Suppose the station is not now redundant and worth fixing?)

Hope those aboard will cope and stay safe.

reply to post by dowot

More pollution by man into the pristineness that is space!

Nope. Anything in orbits as low as the ISS is doomed to fall back to Earth.

Our atmosphere already has very small amounts of amonia in it. So a little more won't be noticed.

reply to post by samkent


Was meant more as humour, hence the lol at the end of the second paragraph, but thanks for giving me a bit more knowledge, never too old to learn.

There is a good write up on the situation on the BBC web site. www.bbc.co.uk...

Back in 2007 there was a problem in the same area that was not fixed till 2012. Bit like one of my old cars, fix one leak and another springs up a bit later. Hope they are more successful than I am.