The International Space Station leak saga took a disturbing turn on Friday

“Following the new release, Roscosmos has decided to continue the recovery mission on Friday, June 5,” NASA spokeswoman Bethany Stevens said. wrote on X. “Out of an abundance of caution, NASA has ordered all four members of SpaceX Crew-12 and NASA astronaut Chris Williams to remain safely aboard the Dragon spacecraft while repairs are underway.”

Back to normal

After about 90 minutes, the mission control officer in Houston told the crew that they could reopen the hatches and re-enter space. The actual repair work that led NASA to issue a safety plan was canceled. “Our Russian colleagues have decided to test only today. Therefore, we are free to leave the security arrangements,” mission commanders told the crew.

“We don’t have help from our friends?” Crew-12 commander Jessica Meir asked for mission control. “Confirm,” mission control replied.

Those friends– Russian cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikayev–they were working on the dump on the other side of the station, about 200 meters from the Crew Dragon.

Stevens recently wrote change on Xwriting that Roscosmos “suspended” “structural maintenance work” within PrK to take more measurements and analyze data. “We look forward to working with Roscosmos on a collaborative approach to dealing with the spill,” Stevens said.

Ars asked two NASA spokespeople to learn more about the leak’s preparation and why the agency thought the preparation was too risky to order US crews into the Crew Dragon rescue boat. They did not provide answers to these questions at the time of this book, but we will add whatever we can find in this article.