NASA is progressing with the ISS mission after air leakage repairs

NASA is looking to launch the fourth special mission of Axiom Space to the International Space Station (ISS) this week, after recent attempts to repair air leaks in the Russian unit had succeeded.

Last week, the Space Agency suddenly postponed the launch of the Axiom Mission 4, which was appointed on June 11. Nassa He was martyred with a new pressure signal in a slice of the Zvezda service unit This was very slowly leakage, for nearly six years. In follow -up statement On Saturday, NASA explained that the pressure signal (a change in air flow or the compression of the cabin captured by sensors) may be a sign that the leaks have been closed. However, there is also an opportunity that the air is starting to flow into a different area in the back of the Russian unit, which leads to the new pressure signal.

“After the most distant repair, the pressure on the transport tunnel was stable. Previously, the pressure in this area had decreased,” NASA wrote in a statement. “This can be indicated that small leaks have been closed. The teams also study that stable pressure may be the result of a small amount of air flowing to the transport tunnel by sealing the opening from the main part of (space station).”

NASA monitors the change in the pressure over time, evaluates the state of the transport tunnel and seal the opening between the space station and the Zvezda unit. Meanwhile, the agency decided to move forward with the launch of the AX-4 earlier on Thursday, June 19. He will lead the veteran mission in Spaceflight Peggy Whitson, the former NASA astronaut who holds the national record for the cumulative days he spent in space. It will join the pilot Chophncho Chocolate from India, the mission specialist Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski from Poland, and mission specialist Tipur Kabo from Hungary.

The decision to postpone the task was to allow more time to NASA and the Russian Space Agency, RoscOSMOS, to assess the situation on the International Space Station and determine whether more errors are needed to explore and fix them before adding more crew members to the space station. In its latest statement, NASA said, “The teams make progress in assessing the formation of the transport tunnel.”

Rososmos for the first time was informed of the leakage in August 2020, where it follows him to the Zvezda Life Support Unit that Russia launched to the low Earth orbit in July 2000. Since then, the rate in which the air leaks from the Zvezda service unit has leakage One pound per day doubled to a little more than two pounds per dayAccording to a report issued in 2024, this led to raising NASA to raise the level of leakage to the highest level of risk. At that time, this was reported NASA and Dosskosos could not agree on the fundamental cause of the leakage Or a way to fix it.

Although it took years for treatment, recent reform efforts show some progress in an attempt to repair the leaked space station. Whether ISS aging is decent to host more astronauts at the present time it still must be seen.