Smoke alarms go off at the International Space Station

https://www.euronews.com/2021/09/09/smoke-alarms-go-off-at-the-international-space-station

by underscore_ku • 5 years ago

43 32 5 years ago

dddw• 5 years ago

Ah man, and this just after the other incident where the Russian module boosters went off and the Russian agency wasn't able to communicate with it being out of reach.

Steltek• 5 years ago

The crew activated air filters and returned to their "night rest" once the air quality was back to normal, the agency stated.

Really? Shouldn't they have investigated a wee bit more or did they also wave a magazine around at the --ceiling-- bulkhead? This reads like "normal people stuff" and not what I'd expect from people on a space station.

tailspin20193• 5 years ago

I thought the same. What an odd statement from a space agency.

Even the article title downplays it. Why is the headline "smoke alarms go off" as opposed to "something was on fire" (aka visible smoke and burning smell). Smoke alarms going off can be a false detection.

The news here is something was literally burning on the ISS and the secondary news is that according to the relevant space agency they didn't even find out what it was before going back to sleep.

blamazon• 5 years ago

Alternate framing: benevolent space agency prioritizes flight crew rest while ground crew monitors and prepares a response to an ongoing mild emergency situation.

elliekelly• 5 years ago

I wonder how closely the State Department is involved in the ISS and associated PR? I don’t mean that in a tinfoil hat conspiracy way but as a genuine question. I can certainly understand that (whether the State Dept. is involved or not) NASA is walking a fine in dealing with their Russian counterparts. I’m sure, like most of us at work, they have to pick and choose their battles and occasionally acquiesce to an official story they know doesn’t quite add up.

SiempreViernes4• 5 years ago

It's reported in other sources that they did go check and couldn't find anything, ROSCOSMOS just didn't put that in their tweet it seems.

rob74• 5 years ago

Yeah, that sounded like a bit of a cavalier attitude towards the problem for me too... and I couldn't help but wonder if it would have been investigated more thoroughly if it had happened in the non-Russian part.

tailspin20193• 5 years ago

In fairness, I'm guessing that the problem here is the reporting of the situation and likely not the reality of what they actually did on board. I'd be really surprised if they didn't follow the correct procedures as well as actually identify the source of the issue.

What's most likely is simply that the statement released about the incident down plays it (as we've seen before) and omits the most important detail (what was on fire... was it important... etc)

SiempreViernes4• 5 years ago

Reportedly they did go have a look, but couldn't find anything.

https://twitter.com/cbs_spacenews/status/1435928837347500035...

gizmondo• 5 years ago

ISS appears to be falling apart. Is it a change in publicity or real?

plopz2• 5 years ago

Its actually falling apart, roscosmos has been saying their segments have outlived the expected lifetime of the station for a few years now.

yardie3• 5 years ago

ISS has been running continuously for 22 years. Most earth based housing doesn't even have that level of uptime. If it were a cruise or cargo ship it would have been in and out of drydock 5-7 times. It's extremely difficult to have complex systems run continuously for decades.

Unfortunately after we built ISS I thought there would be ISS2 or ISS upgrades planned. And I haven't seen anything like that.

gruez2• 5 years ago

Most earth based housing doesn't even have that level of uptime

are we including mud huts and/or poorly built apartments in chinese ghost cities here? If we only considered american timber framed houses, I don't see why 22+ years of "uptime" would be hard to achieve.

conistonwater4• 5 years ago

But Earth-based stuff isn't designed to last too long precisely because it can be maintained. Why wouldn't the ISS be somewhat different in this regard? I don't really see how this analogy is supposed to work.

rapnie• 5 years ago

Let's say they decide to put it out of commission. How do they get rid of it? Regular orbit needs to be actively maintained, I think. Will they let it enter the atmosphere, whole or in chunks?

conistonwater4• 5 years ago

When there was a fire on Mir, Nasa said "Small Fire Extinguished on Mir" [1], and the actual thing was pretty severe: "The flames were large enough to span the breadth of Kvant-1, cutting off access to one of two Soyuz escape capsules", "Thick smoke rapidly enveloped the entire station, forcing all crewmembers to don oxygen masks." [2]

Given all the recent trouble Roscosmos had with the new module in addition to the engine malfunction, I wonder how bad the situation really is. What's the worst that can happen here?

[1] https://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/news/releases/1996_1998...

[2] https://sma.nasa.gov/docs/default-source/safety-messages/saf...

jack_riminton• 5 years ago

More accurate headline: Russian batteries start to smoke and melt plastic onboard the ISS

tailspin20193• 5 years ago

Do you have a source for this?

SiempreViernes4• 5 years ago

William Harwood (@cbs_spacenews) ISS: Station crew looked behind panels near the smoke alarm that tripped, but did not see anything obvious; filters were activated to remove the odor and after discussions, the crew was told to go back to bed

https://twitter.com/cbs_spacenews/status/1435928837347500035...

Giorgi• 5 years ago

Russians need to cope with that fact that they are not in a position to have space program.

Smoke alarms go off at the International Space Station

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