Due to poor communications between U.S. and Russian
astronauts, the International Space Station is a disaster
waiting to happen, according to an ex-safety official at
NASA. There have been three incidents so far that could
have led to serious problems, all caused by miscommunication
between U.S. and Russian engineers who are working in the
station together.
Arthur Zygielbaum, who pointed out this problem, is one of
the 9 safety experts who resigned from NASA last week. He
says safety problems aboard the ISS are being brushed aside
in the same way problems with foam insulation on the space
shuttle were ignored by NASA. "We think we see a trend on
the space station that is as significant as the foam," he
says. "We have had three incidences of miscommunications or
different purposes between the Russians and the Americans
that have endangered the space station."
The space station's altitude can be controlled either by firing
rockets on a docked Russian cargo ship, called the Progress,
or by using gyroscopes to twist the orbiting lab. He
says, "Last week, the signal was sent too early to the
Progress to fire the thrusters and the reaction wheels fought
that move." The gyroscopes ended up working against the
rockets, endangering the control devices.
On an earlier shuttle mission, the Russians measured one way
and the Americans another. As a result, the space station
drifted out of control momentarily. In a third incident, a
battery was brought to the station even though the
Americans did not want it there. After the Columbia accident
caused the U.S. space shuttle to be grounded, we've relied
on the Russians to help us rotate crews and to send up
supplies to the ISS. "We are walking on eggs (with the
Russians) because of different philosophies," Zygielbaum
says, "and we don't want to raise antagonism on either side."
About his resignation from NASA, Zygielbaum says, "We
decided the professional thing for us to do was to resign to
give [NASA administrator Sean] O'Keefe the flexibility he
needed to reconstitute the panel." The Aerospace Safety
Advisory Panel (ASAP) was established by Congress after the
1967 Apollo 1 fire, which killed three astronauts.
The Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) says the
ASAP lacks influence with NASA. "Many of the cultural issues
identified by the CAIB are in our annual reports" but were
ignored, says Zygielbaum. "That underscores our lack of
influence." He admits the ASAP safety panel missed the
importance of the falling foam insulation, "but so did every
other advisory board?The foam has been falling off since the
first flight." He says the Senate committee report "basically
said that we were culpable for the death of seven people (on
Columbia). That is a hard thing to take."
Did you know that a NASA engineer wrote a book about the
UFOs he saw and his attempts to understand how they
function?
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