All seven astronaut presently aboard the International Space Station are having to take shelter inside their respective spacecraft owe to the sudden appearing of a debris swarm in orbit . The U.S. State Department says the fragments were give rise by a Russian anti - satellite projectile test .
info is slowly trickle in , but we do know that the ISS is presently functioning unremarkably and that all seven crowd members are level-headed and dependable . The gang had to take shelter earlier this morning after the breakup of the defunct orbiter Kosmos-1408 , which was hit as part of a Russian anti - satellite weapon mental testing , enunciate Ned Price , a spokesperson for the U.S. State Department , at a press briefing held this afternoon . damage say the U.S. is tracking around 1,500 pieces of debris but that many thousands of untraceable smaller fragment were in all probability develop as well .
NASA astronauts Raja Chari , Tom Marshburn , Kayla Barron , and ESA spaceman Matthias Maurer are sheltering inside a SpaceX Crew Dragon docked to the ISS , while Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov , Pyotr Dubrov , and NASA spaceman Mark Vande Hei are inside a Soyuz space capsule , reportsRussian state - owned newsworthiness office TASS . The astronauts could use these spacecraft to safely revert to Earth in the event the ISS is damaged by the debris .
The International Space StationImage: Roscosmos
Alive feedof NASA mission control audio is usable , along with bouncy video of the ISS .
The crew was instruct to close up the hatches between the U.S. and Russian segment as well as radial hatches that varnish off several modules , including ESA ’s Columbus module , as CBSreports , adding that the stellate hatches might have to outride closed for an full day .
In atweet , Roscosmos say the crew is “ routinely performing operations according to the flight of stairs platform , ” and that the threatening “ object ” has “ move forth from the ISS orbit . ” By “ object , ” the Russian quad agency is refer to the dust field . The “ place is in the green geographical zone , ” Roscosmos tote up . “ Friends , everything is regular with us!,”tweetedShkaplerov . “ We continue to solve on the programme . ”
Despite these word of reassurance , procedure aboard the ISS are most certainly not back to normal . delegation comptroller are continually providing countdowns of each dust field transit ( i.e. the closest approach of the debris study to the ISS ) . At 10:32 a.m. ET , controllers provided instructions for the NASA work party to temporarily accede into the Columbus module to execute some quick task and to collect personal items should they have to rest inside Dragon overnight ( a possible indication that this could take a while ) .
The debris theater of operations transits are happen about once every 93 minutes . In an electronic mail , Harvard University astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell said that , assuming it ’s a debris field get by a break - up orbiter , “ there will be a self-aggrandizing error bar on whether there is risk to ISS , hence the caution . ”
There are reports , that Russia has conducted an Anti - satellite ( # ASAT ) weapons mental testing . Target was an old Soviet Tselina - five hundred SIGINT satellite call Kosmos-1408 ( 1982 - 092A ) launched in 1982 , which has been dead for decades . 14 debris aim have been tracked.https://t.co/3rtUpvoMjN
— Gunter Krebs 🚀 🛰 🇺 🇦 🏳 ️ 🌈 ( @Skyrocket71)November 15 , 2021
U.S. Space Force “ is mindful of a debris - render event in outer space ” and is “ working to characterize the debris field and will continue to assure all space - fare commonwealth have the information necessary to manoeuver satellites if impacted,”tweetedspace reporter Joey Roulette from the New York Times .
In a tweet , Seradata , a society responsible for uphold the SpaceTrak launch and planet database , saysKosmos-1408 ’s orbit was “ a bit higher than ISS but not much , ” adding that the presumed ASAT strike on the satellite “ would get some debris to be open fire below it … jeopardize ISS with a cross debris cloud . ”
Our initial data show at least 30 unique objects find near expected localization of Cosmos 1408 . The object currently span a distance chain of ~40 km as viewed from our radar sites .
These data plots show a subset of the objects ( 12 ) , suggest by orange dots circled in red.pic.twitter.com/vsSAcA7GVv
— LeoLabs ( @LeoLabs_Space)November 15 , 2021
information gather by space detritus track party LeoLabs shows “ at least 30 unique target detect near expected location ” of the Russian satellite . McDowell expects “ thousands of objet d’art of cataloged debris from a satellite the size of it of Kosmos-1408 , ” as satellites of this type weigh rough 3,860 pounds ( 1,750 kg ) , as he pointed out in atweet , adding that “ it may take days to weeks for the first dust objects to be cataloged and years from them all to be located . ”
Today ’s incident comes less than a week after the ISS had to make anemergency maneuverto evade potentially threatening space junk . In that case , it was a remnant of the Fengyun-1C weather planet , which China deliberately destroyed in 2007 as part of an anti - satellite missile test . India did something similar in 2019 , join the United States , Russia , and China as countries that have tested anti - satellite weapon system . presently , the usance of ASATs “ absorb a grey-haired zone ” when it follow to international weapon controller , writesTalia M. Blatt from Harvard University .
This is a developing tale and we will update this clause as we memorize more .
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