NASA has announced that the International Space Station (ISS) experienced a short circuit in its power system and may require a spacewalking mission to make the necessary repairs.
The American space agency said the framework of the ISS caused a glitch in its current-switching device on Friday, leaving its six-man crew with one less power source to use. The astronauts have since switched to alternate lines to power the space station's affected systems.
Dan Huot, NASA's spokesman, said the crew of the ISS is not in any danger and have been operating on the orbital facility normally. He added that a similar power failure had occurred before on the space station in 2014.
Huot said a replacement part of the short circuited equipment is expected to be delivered to the ISS via SpaceX rocket early next year. SpaceX, however, has been grounded for months after suffering a mishap during a rocket launch in June.
Orbital ATK, another commercial supplier for NASA, is scheduled to deliver a shipment to the ISS in the next few weeks. The delivery comes a year after the company experienced a failed launch of its own.
Other Issues ISS Astronauts Had to Face
The circuit issues on the International Space Station last week is just one of the challenges its crew had to face in recent months.
Earlier this month, astronauts Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren conducted a spacewalk to return the space station's port truss cooling system to its original settings following the completion of repair work in 2012. They were assisted by fellow ISS astronaut Kimiya Yui who coordinated the spacewalkers' activities from inside orbital facility.
The ISS crew had to deal with cables and tanks of ammonia fluid during their spacewalk.
In October, Kelly and Lindgren also carried out several repairs on equipment outside the ISS. The duo applied a thermal cover on the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02), which is a device used by NASA scientists to measure antimatter in cosmic rays as well as look for evidence of dark matter, and lubricated one of the latching ends of the space station's robotic arm known as Canadarm2.
The ISS astronauts also had to deal with the potential spread of bacteria and fungi after a recent study found traces of microorganisms in dust particles collected from the orbital facility.
While the researchers did not specify whether the microbes discovered on the ISS are harming the crew, they did warn that these microorganisms could cause inflammation and skin irritations in space.
Photo: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center | Flickr
