Washington: NASA on Monday cancelled a spacewalk at the International Space Station after water leaked from an astronaut's spacesuit. Astronauts Tracy Dyson and Mike Barratt opened the hatch to the space station's airlock when Dyson reported water leaking from her spacesuit's cooling system. The leak occurred when Dyson switched her spacesuit to battery power. The astronauts hadn't floated outside yet.
“There's literally water everywhere here now,” Barratt said.
The duo were not in danger, according to NASA. The astronauts were supposed to remove a faulty communications box and collect microbe samples from outside the orbiting laboratory. The spacewalk was planned for nearly seven hours, but lasted only a half hour. Earlier this month, a spacewalk was postponed after another astronaut experienced “spacesuit discomfort.”
NASA then focused on safely bringing Dyson back inside the space station from the airlock, the portal to the station’s exterior, while her suit continued operating on battery power, CNN reported.
According to NASA, the crew was never in danger during the incident. The spacewalk, scheduled to begin Monday morning and last approximately 6.5 hours, was delayed, adding to a series of recent setbacks in operations on the International Space Station. This marks the second recent spacewalk to be abruptly cancelled due to spacesuit issues.
On June 13, officials cancelled a spacewalk that was to include Dyson and Matthew Dominick because of a "spacesuit discomfort issue" with Dominick’s suit. NASA did not disclose further details to respect the astronaut’s privacy. In addition to the postponed Monday spacewalk, NASA has been planning another for July 2, ahead of Boeing’s Starliner capsule receiving clearance to undock from the orbiting laboratory and return to Earth.
The Starliner spacecraft has been conducting its first crewed test flight to the space station, encountering significant issues such as helium leaks and thruster outages during its outbound journey, resulting in delays for its return. It remains uncertain whether the decision to cancel Monday’s spacewalk will further postpone Starliner's return.
(With inputs from agency)
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