Minor Leak Being Investigated Aboard the ISS

Josh Fink writes "Space.com is reporting that the International Space Station has a minor atmosphere leak. 'An inspection of a vestibule bridging the station's new Harmony connecting module and NASA's Destiny laboratory indicated a slight air leak of about three pounds (1.3 kilograms) per day ..A close-up inspection of the vestibule seal by the station's three-astronaut Expedition 16 crew using an ultrasonic leak detector found no trace of a leak on Wednesday, [NASA spokesperson Lynette Madison] said. Studies of the station's overall internal pressure also found no signs of decay, she added.' While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately."

Comments

Comes with the territory

[SIGALRM]

I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately

Being "for the space program" requires some acceptance of the massive risks inherent in manned space travel. If mechanical systems are design-simplified it may reduce points of failure.

KERMIt, a "Kit for External Repair of Module Impacts", is one of those simple systems being developed at Marshall Research to seal punctures in the ISS. It will enable crewmembers to seal punctures from outside damaged modules that have lost atmospheric pressure. Delivery of the kit is scheduled for next year. KERMIt is also useful for sealing leaking atmospheric seals as TFF article describes (more info here).

Re:Comes with the territory

[iminplaya]

Being "for the space program" requires some acceptance of the massive risks inherent in manned space travel.

You're not kidding. The submitter's complaint is like bitching about the Wright Brother's airplane not being able to fly 100 people across the Atlantic by the end of 1904. The thing is an experiment, ok? Some problems may be due to poor decision making, but I think we can still cut them some slack here. This is not like the Challenger disaster where I believe upper management committed criminal negligence for political expediency. They were warned about that impending failure to the point that the TV news reporters were discussing it before launch. So they got a leak. Use it to ventilate the bathroom.

Re:Comes with the territory

[edwardpickman]

KERMIT's a weird name for a chewing gum?

Re:Comes with the territory

[fahrbot-bot]

KERMIt, a "Kit for External Repair of Module Impacts", is one of those simple systems being developed at Marshall Research to seal punctures in the ISS.

The kit contains foil and a pack of Tropical Fruit Bubbalicious...

Re:Comes with the territory

[bouchecl]

'TFF article'? The fucking (flying|furry|funny|filler|funky|frilly|foofy|fucking) article? ... the featured article. After all, this is a family-friendly site! Or is it? :)

Re:Comes with the territory

[SetupWeasel]

Being "for the space program" requires some acceptance of the massive risks inherent in manned space travel.

Unfortunately NASA's current high-risk/low-reward policies haven't produced results that would validate the cost.

Re:Comes with the territory

[Anonymous Coward]

The purpose of the ISS is to learn how to build and maintain large facilities in space. It is a learning process. My question to those that use issues like this as a reason to criticize the ISS is simple: Would you rather have this kind of problem come up on a lunar base where the crew was three days, not two hours from safety? How about on a Mars mission where there was no chance of sending repair parts or rescuing the crew? It is far better to discover issues like this, or the torn solar panel, or the metal shavings they found in an array rotary junction, now and figure out how to deal with it and prevent it from happening again in the wading pool of low Earth orbit rather than in the deep ocean of space.

Re:Comes with the territory

[bondjamesbond]

They should just open a big can of fix-a-flat, no?

Re:Comes with the territory

[Loether]

I agree, Then spin the space station up to 60 rpms so it gives an even coat to the IIS's insides.

Re:Comes with the territory

[Anonymous Coward]

Only if the US government chipped in 0.5% of the annual budget to help the Wright Brothers build their planes would it be a valid comparison.

Re:Comes with the territory

[iminplaya]

"Damn perfectionist." :-)

The Wright brothers weren't spending my tax dollars on their experiments.

Damn! You ARE old.

Re:Comes with the territory

[iminplaya]

We are paying the government to conduct scientific testing..in space. The key word is testing. Are you,too, expecting them to bat a thousand? If you think you can do it better, you know the routine. Pick up a hammer and screwdriver and build your own space station. I'm glad all these naysayers weren't around when the government decided to buy Alaska from the Russians. And it (the gov't) caught a lot of hell at the time. The biggest problem with NASA and space exploration in general is that it has become so politicized. I happened to consider exploration and the acquisition of knowledge to be a good thing. And I believe we should increase the funding to at least 1% of the budget. *sigh*

Re:Comes with the territory

[The_Laughing_God]

Darn right, a total air leak of this magnitude (1.3 kg/day = 40 kg/mo -- call it a welding tank a month) would hardly be noted on a nuclear submarine on a multi-month submerged mission. Yes, leaks are more worrisome in space where air cannot be replenished readily, and every kilogram of supplies is expensive -- but it's still well under the mass of personal consumables for a single crewman, and crew supplies are a modest fraction of the content of each resupply mission.

Ignore it? Of course not. But put to scale (or compared to on-board reserves), it's less significant than a car that uses a quart of oil every month or three.

It was entirely unnoticed by all earlier testing until the most recent "fine scale" tests, just as you might never know you were riding in a car that was burning a little oil, or a home furnace that could be better tuned. Again, yes, lifting supplies to orbit is expensive, but 1.3 kg/d requires no change the capacity or frequency of resupply missions, even if it were ignored. It's not a big deal to the people who actually have to deal with it, but apparently some armchair geeks are worried.

Re:Comes with the territory

[Adambomb]

The kit contains a foil pack of Tropical Fruit Bubbalicious. Efficiency!

Re:Comes with the territory

[Anonymous Coward]

That just might actually work...

Still I don't think patching is the problem, but rather finding the leak in the first place.

Now they just need someone to go around dousing the outside with soapy water to see where the bubbles start coming from. (Or get some other kind of visible marker substance for leak detection that wouldn't be too harmful to breathe in on occasion because it's a zero-G environment.)

Re:Comes with the territory

[Anonymous Coward]

"..While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end?.."

RTFM!!! The article makes clear that a warning was given that a leak was detected, but the station was loosing NO air pressure, and a mobile leak detector FAILED to find any leak.

Under these circumstances I would suspect that the warning was a false alarm, not that there was a problem with the ISS.

Re:Comes with the territory

[DanJ_UK]

Muppet's included too.

ultrasonic leak detector?

[Anonymous Monkey]

Just wondering, but did a blue box show up on the IIS?

Re:ultrasonic leak detector?

[Ilan Volow]

It's called a blue screen of death. I've heard it's quite common on IIS.

Re:ultrasonic leak detector?

[turgid]

What's wrong with a bowl of water and a drop of washing-up liquid?

Re:ultrasonic leak detector?

[Presto Vivace]

somehow "minor leak" and "international space station" don't belong in the same sentence.

I Agree!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like, when I drive to Dallas to Houston I don't have any problems. But when NASA tries to build a space station in orbit stuff goes wrong!

What is up with that?

Re:I Agree!

[Hatta]

I guess you don't have out of state plates then.

Re:I Agree!

[Anonymous Coward]

Dane Cook reads Slashdot?

"when will it end?"

[taniwha]

hopefully never - the whole point is it's an engineering experiment, if nothing fails they won't learn anything, it'll just be a bunch of guys sitting around wondering what they're doing there

Re:"when will it end?"

[Gov.Kodos]

It's true that the station itself is an "Experiment" to some extent and that they learn a lot from the failures. But they never sit around wondering why they are up there, they have more "real" experiments to do than they have time for. Besides, learning that something got stuck on the seal before they connected the two segments would hardly be a valuable scientific discovery. That would be like notifying Goodyear that their tires go flat when you drive over a nail! duh!!

Re:"when will it end?"

[MightyYar]

Besides, learning that something got stuck on the seal before they connected the two segments would hardly be a valuable scientific discovery. That isn't necessarily the case. It would show that their current procedure of ensuring a clean seal is either not good enough, or the seal is not robust enough to handle unavoidable amount of contamination. In either case, it is better to discover this in low earth orbit than on the moon or on Mars.

Going to space is hard

[TooMuchToDo]

While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately."

Going to space is hard. It shouldn't stop us from doing it. Issues will crop up.

Re:Going to space is hard

[morgan_greywolf]

Not only is it hard, but it is inherently dangerous. And guess what? The men and women that don the spacesuits? They were all told that when they signed up. Canning the space program because it's dangerous is like canning the Armed Forces because it's dangerous. Soldiers get killed everyday in Iraq. I don't hear anyone calling for an end to the Marines.

Re:Going to space is hard

[afidel]

That and we're doing it on the cheap. Even at the height of the Apollo program we were still spending less as a percentage of GDP on exploration than the Spanish had during Columbus's time or the Persians or Romans had during their time. Americans like to think of ourselves as explorers, but as a nation we really aren't really into funding exploration like many of our predecessors, we're a lot more like China, fairly isolationists with occasional small forays outside.

Re:Going to space is hard

[antdude]

No, life is just hard even on Earth.

Re:Going to space is hard

[maxume]

Please compute the ROI for exploring space and say, discovering all that gold that Spain got from the new world. The comparison is a non sequitur.

Re:Going to space is hard

[afidel]

nearly unlimited power and far more valuable metals that have been mined in the history of mankind, I'de say space exploration will pay huge dividends in the end. In fact in probably about the same timeframe as the exploration of the Americas if we actually put the resources into it.

Re:Going to space is hard

[6]

Spain did not know they would gain gold from an undiscovered continent when they funded Columbus. In point of fact they funded this explorer for a different goal (discover a sea route to India) under a flawed assumption (the idea that the earth is much smaller than it really is)

The point being that investing in research and exploration does not always work the way you expect or bring the results you were expecting. However historically nothing has payed off better.

Re:Going to space is hard

[Dr. Cody]

we're a lot more like China, fairly isolationists with occasional small forays outside.

A people who travel half-way around the Globe to found concentrated enclaves where they call the locals "foreigners."

Re:Going to space is hard

[maxume]

I don't have a problem with space exploration(well, not one that fits into ten words. Suffice it to say I don't have a lot of hope for chemical rockets and don't see anything better coming in the next several decades). I have a problem with bothering to compare the financing to history.

"Oops."

[pwnies]

"Nobody is really concerned about this," Madison said. If I were in the space station, I think this would be the equivalent of a doctor performing fully conscious brain surgery on me and hearing him say, "Oops. Aahhh its not that big of a deal."

Re:"Oops."

[NeilTheStupidHead]

I think a better analogy would be a haemophiliac with a small cut on his (or her) finger: something that has to be addressed, certainly, but not immediately life threatening.

Each module was independantly sealed as the station was built. Would it not be possible to 'close the door' on each module, all at once or by turns, and locate, at least generally, the leak?

Re:"Oops."

[Anonymous Coward]

If I were in the space station, I think this would be the equivalent of a doctor performing fully conscious brain surgery on me and hearing him say, "Oops. Aahhh its not that big of a deal."

This happened to my brother. Except it wasn't brain surgery, it was hand surgery and the doctor didn't say "oops", he used a different expletive.

Problems never end

[YA_Python_dev]

I agree.

While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end?

Never. When you build something big, hardware or software, you will have problems. You can't expect to have everything always work the first time.

When you encounter a problem you fix it, it's that simple.

Remember: "The perfect is the enemy of the good." -- Voltaire

Re:Problems never end

[Anonymous Coward]

When you encounter a problem you fix it, it's that simple.

And more importantly, you get better at fixing them. That's really why we're out there after all. We're gaining experience that can only be gained the real way.

Re:Problems never end

[DerekLyons]

When you build something big, hardware or software, you will have problems. You can't expect to have everything always work the first time.

Or even the n th time. A system as large and complex as the ISS will always have problems. Period.

Re:Problems never end

[aurispector]

This whole article is bizarre. How could you possibly think that this is easy? First, you ride a giant goddamn bomb into orbit. If it doesn't explode and you manage not to fling yourself into deep space, once in orbit you have to do everything in zero gee and a vacuum. There is no atmospheric shielding from solar radiation. Once you are finished attempting to survive, the ride home consists of falling through the atmosphere at speeds great enough to cause instant incineration due to atmospheric friction. In the past people have died from every one of these hazards (except perhaps the radiation - anyone have data on cancer rates among astronauts?). These are the *known* and *predictable* hazards.

If people ever make it to Mars and back it will be a freaking miracle.

Re:Problems never end

[Rei]

Exactly. My thought when I read this:

NEWS FLASH: Massive, One-Of-A-Kind Contraption With Millions Of Parts In Hostile, Minimally Understood Environment Suffers New Glitch Every Few Months

In other news, the sun rose in the East today...

Re:Problems never end

[Original Replica]

you get better at fixing them. That's really why we're out there after all. We're gaining experience that can only be gained the real way.

I have heard the ISS being criticized as having outlived it's usefulness, but I disagree primarily for the reason you stated. Sure the science experiments are nice, but the real experiment is the station itself, maintaining that thing is the best current path towards ever setting foot on Mars or getting significant numbers of humans in space. That said I have to wonder if the ISS could be bumped into a lower maintenance orbit and used as a hub for a bolo style rotating space station. I think we need to work on taking steps towards autonomous space stations and vehicles. Rather than a trip to the moon, I would be far more excited to hear about an ISS greenhouse that does all of the air and water maintenance (keeping the machines for backup) and supplies a large portion of the food. Not as flashy but more a useful learning experience IMHO.

Re:Problems never end

[david.given]

That said I have to wonder if the ISS could be bumped into a lower maintenance orbit and used as a hub for a bolo style rotating space station.

It's too low as it is --- there's enough air resistance that it has to be reboosted at intervals to keep it in orbit. (It has to be that low because otherwise the shuttles can't get there. They have lousy range.) Lowering the orbit any further would be very dangerous.

As for spinning it (you did mean bola, right? Unless you were actually thinking of giant robotic tanks, which I will admit would be quite cool), not only is it not designed for that and would fall apart, but if you want gravity there's plenty on Earth, where it's quite cheap. One of the main purposes for getting into space is to get free fall.

I rather regret that Mir was destroyed for purely political reasons. If the ISS was built as a set of add-on modules to Mir, gradually superseding Mir's own modules as they began to break down, construction could have gone a lot faster. Even if the Mir modules stopped working completely, they'd still have considerable value as salvage.

Rather than a trip to the moon, I would be far more excited to hear about an ISS greenhouse that does all of the air and water maintenance.

I want a balloon. A ten or twenty metre inflatable habitat module, semitransparent hopefully, in which plants a grown. Inflatables and plastics are the future of spaceflight; look at the cool stuff that Bigelow Aerospace are doing. But even they are simply replicating existing modules using inflatables. It ought to be possible to use the new materials to radically change the way space stations are built. How about a 100m wide spherical envelope, full of air, with your space station built inside? Now, that would be cool, particularly once you have a decent amount of plant life in there...

Re:Problems never end

[Cecil]

It's too low as it is --- there's enough air resistance that it has to be reboosted at intervals to keep it in orbit. (It has to be that low because otherwise the shuttles can't get there. They have lousy range.) Lowering the orbit any further would be very dangerous.

I think you missed a word, he said lower maintenance orbit, not lower orbit. Kind of counterintuitive that a lower maintenance orbit would be higher, I guess, but I'm pretty sure that's what he meant. Higher, less air, less boosting, less maintenance.

Re:Problems never end

[Yetihehe]

When a man falls from tree and he is okay, is it a miracle? No, he just had luck. When he falls second time and is ok, is it a miracle? No, he is very lucky. And when he falls third time, is it a miracle? No, it's just a habit. The same will happen with journey to Mars, we are now getting accustomed with things that can go wrong, so we can eliminate them.

Re:Problems never end

[aurispector]

Picky picky! The point is, we can NEVER anticipate and eliminate all possible hazards-we can only attempt to reduce the hazards. There are no trees in space and if we fall it's a looooong freaking way down.

Re:Problems never end

[rainer_d]

> NEWS FLASH: Massive, One-Of-A-Kind Contraption
> With Millions Of Parts In Hostile,

You forgot to add:
"All from the lowest bidder".

these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

guys... I work for nasa on the space station program... i am amazed at how people frame the detection and fixing of problems on the space station are such a negative thing... the space station construction is so incredibly difficult and complex... and when we have issues, people point them out as never ending. This is the 2nd space station... compare that to the 2nd airplane.

And the biggest thing that amazes me is that these problems are the biggest reason to have the space station!!! We have to learn how to fly in space long term... and fix problems just like these!! what kind of problems do you think we will have when we go to the moon and mars?? do people honestly think if we just drop what we are doing and took off trying to get to mars, we would find out just how much learning we have left to do.

overall, i think the american public is left feeling ashamed of the problems they see on the ISS, instead of being proud of the accomplishment because they don't really comprehend just how insane the Apollo successes were, and how ahead of their time they were. We really do have a lot left to learn about flying in space and fixing things in space with the materials in place, and unless we want to take insane risks and costs like were done in the Apollo program, we need to do that with the space station.

these problems... their detection, isolation, and recovery, are the greatest asset of the space station.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

I know you guys are working with a neutered budget, but that doesn't mean they had to pawn off your [shift] key. That was totally lame on their part.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[boris111]

I think you're preaching to the choir on this one. A lot of us write software. Enough said! Stuff breaks... fix it move on.

I find it strange that a NASA spokesperson would say something negative about something that she's supposed to be supporting. Unless she has a vested interest in Moon to Mars program.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[stevied]

This is the 2nd space station...

2nd?

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

It is not the second space station by a long shot. Russia's had a couple Salyuts and Mir, we had Skylab, now there's ISS. That's off the top of my head.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

they don't really comprehend just how insane the Apollo successes were

Then they should get off their lazy asses and watch more movies.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the 2nd space station...

While there have been relatively few space stations before this, there have been far, far more than just one. Try googling "Mir" instead of "Skylab".

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

>when will it end

or event compare it to current airplanes - things are always going wrong and getting fixed maintained.

or how about your car - changing the tires, filling with gas, changing the muffler, oil, getting services - when will that end?

equipment needs constant servicing - especially so in a hostile environment - NASA should brand it under maintenance and there would be a lot less stick.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[R3d M3rcury]

Second space station that NASA has been involved with.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

> This is the 2nd space station...

          Actually, the ISS is the fourth space station. It is NASA's second. Still, your point is a very good one.

http://mrsquid.blocspot.com/

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[popo]

I thought I issued a company-wide memo about NASA employees surfing Slashdot during work-hours.

Please come down to my office right away.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Scotman]

Agreed! Right now you can go buy something at the store and find it fails to perform in some way. In space, that could easily cost you your life. We have to reach for the stars, our future depends on it. But you can't reach for something like space all in an instant. It does take time to see what you are looking at and what it will take. The problems the ISS are having are almost good. They are REAL. They MUST be solved before we can move on. No one in their right mind would want to step onto one of our spaceships and try to go very far. You will not make it with this flimsy technology. It is simply that this is new to us. Poor workmanship and poor design have gotten us this far. But if we want to go lightyears farther we need to fix the little things that we could pass over in the years that have gone by and find out what it takes to survive in space. We in fact have come along way. Don't get distracted by "another problem", it was ALWAYS there, it is just that we got far enough to finally see it.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Blakey Rat]

This is the 2nd space station... compare that to the 2nd airplane.

It's at LEAST the third space station, Mir and Skylab were pretty well-publicized. I'm guessing you don't actually work at NASA.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Fzz]

If you look at the list you linked to, all the Salyuts are very small and just single-launch spacecraft. Skylab is four times larger, but still not that big and still launched in one piece. Only Mir and the ISS are really of large size and involve complex in-orbit assembly. These are the first true space stations - the rest are not in the same league at all and are more like long-duration capsules. So, yes, we really are on the steepest part of the learning curve when it comes to space stations and in-orbit assembly.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[wralias]

overall, i think the american public is left feeling ashamed of the problems they see on the ISS, instead of being proud of the accomplishment because they don't really comprehend just how insane the Apollo successes were, and how ahead of their time they were Hmm.... I don't think Americans are ashamed per se, I think we just don't know what the hell NASA is up to anymore. We never hear about anything until the media tells us, and of course "no gnus is good gnus" as the saying goes.

Back in the Apollo days, there was a great President who kindled our interest in space (Kennedy) and there was a big bad Gorilla in the room (Russia). Now, the big bad Gorilla in the room is our President, so we're kinda busy figuring what the hell to do with our country.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[MarsDefenseMinister]

The reason it's so complex is that we don't have a real heavy lift vehicle assigned to build it. The entire station could have been launched with 2 Saturn V rockets. If you wanted to put the ISS into Lunar orbit, you're still talking only 5 Saturn V rockets.

The kids think you're hot stuff with your complex orbital assembly. The old guys snicker at your tiny tiny rockets.

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[6]

> This is the 2nd space station

Salyut
Skylab
Mir
ISS

I can understand being provincial and not recalling that the Russians were first but how could anyone at NASA forget Skylab?

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[tokul]

This is the 2nd space station... compare that to the 2nd airplane.

Something wrong with your math.

• Salyut space stations (7 working + 2 failures) - 1971-1986
• Skylab - 1973-1979
• Mir - 1986-2001
• IIS - 1998-current

Re:these problems are the reason we need ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm the original poster of this thread... and I should have known better than to put a decimal digit in a frickin slashdot post.

Guys. By 2nd, I mean 2nd space station anywhere _remotely_ close to the size and longevity of the ISS.

The 2nd thing is a distraction from the point... you guys can still see what I mean. We are relatively new to long duration spaceflight.

When will what end?

[Anonymous Coward]

Problems? Never.

pin sized hole hard to reach

[wizardforce]

While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately."

it's probably a leak about the size of a needle hole hidden somewhere out of reach with a simple leak test. it wouldn't need much, 1.3 kg of air is about 1 cubic meter in size leaking over a day's time. considering there's about 10N/cm^2 force and the force exerted by a moving column of air is mv^2 while the density m is 1.28 kg/m^3 solving for the size of a hole required to vent the gas is about 2mm in diameter if back of the envelope calculations are correct [probably not but you get my point]

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[kebes]

Sounds about right. I just ran it through some simple effusion equations (kinetic gas laws). Assuming that the amount of air escaping is 1.3 kg (1.14 m^3), and that the volume of the room it is escaping from is ~200 m^3 (apparently the total final size of the ISS is 1000 m^3), and that the ISS is pressurized to 101.3 kPa (the Wikipedia article says that it is), then we can calculate the time for 1/200 of the air (0.5%) to escape, as a function of the hole diameter. It turns out that a hole of diameter 0.15 mm will lead to that kind of rate of pressure loss (1 m^3 in the first day).

Needles to say, the effusion equations have various assumptions built into them, and I had to make all kinds of assumptions about the values... but at least to within order-of-magnitude, this suggests a pinhole-sized leak.


Details for anyone who cares: The effusion equation can be derived similar to the conventional gas law expressions, by calculating the number of molecules per unit area that impinge on a wall section of a certain size (the hole). (We assume a container in vacuum, so that any molecule that impinges on the hole is lost irreversibly to the outside.) The equation, as you might expect, turn out to be exponential decays (since the derivation incorporates the decreasing internal pressure as air is lost):

N(t)/N_total = exp( -(A/V)*sqrt(k*T/2*pi*m)*t )

or

t = ( -(V/A)*sqrt(2*pi*m/k*T) )*ln(N(t)/N_total)

where:
t, time (until the given loss of atmosphere)
V, volume of container
A, surface area of hole
m, mass of gas molecules
T, temperature (~300 K for room temperature)
k, Boltzmann constant
N(t), # molecules at time t
N_total, total # molecules (initial quantity)

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[megaditto]

You are making too many assumptions. It is simpler and more precise to go this way:
escaped mass m = (hole area)*(time)*(number of collisions with the hole area)

so you get 1.3kg = A * 86400s * 10^5 Pa * sqrt( 29/( 2 *Pi* k *T))

Solving for the round hole A gives you about 33 micron radius (though you are close): 0.033 mm

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[RealGrouchy]

it wouldn't need much, 1.3 kg of air is about 1 cubic meter in size leaking over a day's time. Thanks for putting this amount in different terms.

To a non-physicist like myself (who is used to being in places where the pressure inside the container/vehicle/building is roughly the same as that outside), "three pounds of air" is a hard concept for me to understand, especially when it is "lost".

Compounding this comprehension problem is that pressure is (in some places) measured in pounds per square inch, even though the pounds in that term are in an entirely different context.

However, I still kinda find it hard to grasp the idea of losing a cubic metre of air, because at the end of the day, the ISS's volume hasn't decreased by this amount.

Maybe it would have been more tangible for the article to have expressed this in terms of starting and ending atmospheric pressures inside the ISS after losing 3 lb of air, or at least the percentage difference between these two figures.

- RG>

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[jnadke]

Your equations don't seem to have any base in science. Care to explain where the arbitrary random values (29, etc) came from?

I calculate* the whole diameter as being 0.22 mm from the simple equation of Area = (Volumetric flow) / (Air veloctiy). No need to be more complicated. The hole is small enough that you don't have to worry about pressure gradients and big enough that you don't have to factor in turbulence.

*Proof: I'd imagine the space station is pressurized to 1 atm. Given that 1.3 kg of air leaks out a day, and the density of air at 1 atm is 1.225 kg/m^3, this means the volumetric flow rate is 1.15741 E-5 m^3 per second (assume the space station is so big, the leaking air doesn't change the pressure... I'm sure it carries pressurized tanks to maintin cabin pressure). To solve for the area of the leak A = flow rate / velocity, we need velocity. Velocity can be calculated as sqrt(pressure differential / density). The pressure differential is 1atm = 101,325 Pascals (1 Pa = 1 kg/m/s^2).

Plug it all through and you get an area of 4.024E-8 m^2 for the size of the leak. Assuming it's circular, diameter = 2 * sqrt(Area/pi) = 2.253E-4 meters.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[Wonko the Sane]

A pound can be a measure of force, or of mass. I would imagine they mean three pounds (mass) of air.

If this is the case, you could convert this to a more normal measure of air volume.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[megaditto]

Your formulas are a good first approximation. However, since we are not dealing with a fluid here, they don't work very well (plus I think you mixed up your numerator/denominator somewhere in there).

Anyways, I am sorry for not being very clear in my previous post.

Here is the reasoning: number of molecules that escape depend on the opening area, the time, and the number of collisons. The collisions depend on the pressure, temperature, and the molecular mass only (the formula is p * sqrt(1/(2 k T m)) where P is pressure, k is Boltz. const., T is the abs temp in K, m is the molecular mass).

The final formula looks like:
M_lost=A * time * p * m * sqrt (1/(2 * k * T * m ))

finally, the two m's cancel and you get
M_lost=A * time * p * sqrt (m/(2 * k * T))

Now, M_lost is 1.3
p is 10^5
m is 29 (for air)
k is 8.3
T is 300

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[Anonymous Coward]

Some clarification for you and anyone else seeking it:

Pressure is always in units of force per area-squared, such as psi. The ISS is held at approximately sea level atmospheric pressure (14.7 psi) by an automated system that also removes excess CO2 and water vapor from the air.

In physics and chemistry, you learn early on that a given mass of air at a given temperature has a given volume. This is the ideal gas law. What it means as far as the ISS is concerned, since as you noted the space station didn't shrink, is that if mass is lost (which because of the ideal gas law is equivalent to saying some volume at a given temperature and pressure), then the pressure decreased slightly. Three pounds of air is less than 1% of the atmosphere of the ISS, so the pressure drop would be less than 1%.

However, it's not actually that simple because remember there's the life support system that removes CO2 and water vapor, and adds fresh oxygen, meanwhile keeping the pressure constant. And the ideal gas law also saws the pressure changes with temperature. Because of this, NASA isn't actually sure the air leaked out, but they think it did because some measurements didn't add up, so they're going to do another check.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[wizardforce]

the ISS is about 1,000 cubic meters in size, assuming that the air is not replaced after loss, the pressure decrease would be .001 atmospheres [.999 of what it was before] this is so tiny as to be undetectable by humans. to give you an idea of how small this is, the pressure difference between a clear day and stormy weather is on the order of 100x this pressure difference. The difference in air pressure between sea level [0 feet] and 26 feet above sea level.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[Anonymous Coward]

This just reiterates that operating in space is hard. A 0.15mm hole is obviously a concern when you're in LEO, but not necessarily fatal since there's always the Soyuz lifeboat as a last resort if no resupply is available (e.g., a third and final Shuttle crash and a simultaneous issue with churning out Progress vehicles). It's similarly life-threatening on a lunar base, since there will presumably be a similar life boat option.

It's a whole 'nother story if you're en route to Mars when the leak surfaces, and you're up to thirty months (depending on mission profile, i.e., in situ fuel and oxidizer production versus "load the pack mule with the kitchen sink") away from the nearest oxygen cache. Better to work this stuff out nearby!

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[bishop32x]

I think you're confusing liquid and fluid. A fluid is a substance which is unable to resist any shear stress, and all gases exhibit this behavior. Also, your units seem to be off, if the molecular mass is dimensionless then you're missing a mass^.5 somewhere. If not then you need to account for moles and the fact that m= .029 kg/mol.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[curious.corn]

This thread IS /.

e

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[KDR_11k]

I'd assume NASA's scientific staff uses kg which is a measure of mass.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[zippthorne]

Plugging into google, 3lbs is about 40 cubic feet of air (at STP), which is ~half of a typical recreational SCUBA bottle. An out-of-shape open circuit diver can go through that much air in about 40 minutes at the surface.

There's enough oxygen present for maybe 3x that time. So depending on how they're replenishing gases, they're losing between 40 minutes and 2 hours of breathing gas a day, and depleting their diluent supply.

I wouldn't expect a few days of a leak like that to cause a pressure drop. Once the diluent (and/or stored oxygen) is depleted, then I'd expect to see the slow pressure drop.

Re:pin sized hole hard to reach

[pentalive]

.015mm = 0.00590551181 inches

"Hairs on the head 70cm / 0.35mm" from www.hairformula37.com/chemistry.htm
(just something returned by the google search of".015mm in Human Hairs")

It's a leetle hole.

Gotta take a leak

[Anonymous Coward]

where are those astronaut diapers when ya need them?/

3 lbs a day!?

[jshriverWVU]

While this may sound funny, but isn't that a lot. While air does have weight how much air is 3 lbs? The area over vermont 10' deep?

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[theReal-Hp_Sauce]

I got the impression that it meant 3 Lbs of tank pressure, not 3 Lbs of weight per day.

I'm not sure if that makes it better or worse. Either way, if I was up there I'd be a little concerned.

-Colin

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[wizardforce]

air has a density of about 1.28 kilograms per cubic meter so 1.3 kilograms of air occupies a space just over 1 cubic meter in size, in this case it is 35.9 cubic feet of air to be exact. The fact it has some easily measurable density allows for helium balloons to remain in the air as well as airplanes to shuffle large amounts of air around to create significant lift. the amount of energy air turbines generate depends on the density of air being as high as it is otherwise the airspeed required to produce any amount of power would be much higher if the density were lower.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[compro01]

presuming dry air at sea-level pressure (no idea on the humidity/pressure up on the ISS), it's a little more than 1 cubic metre or 1000 litres.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[Hatta]

One mole of any gas at STP fills 22.4L. Air is roughly 70% N2 and 30% O2. The formula weight of N2 is 14g/mol, and that of O2 is 16g/mol. There are 453g/lb. You can work out the rest yourself.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[Retric]

It depends on temperature and pressure but at Standard Atmospheric Pressure and 20 degrees Celsius
air weighs 1.2 kg/m^3 or 2.6 pounds/m^3.

So it's only 1.15 cubic meters or 49 cubic feet of air per day. My guess is the hole is around 2mm or 1/10th of an inch in size.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[PCM2]

I doubt that. They don't measure pressure in pounds, but in pounds of force distributed over a specific area, e.g. pounds per square inch (PSI).

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[sconeu]

Isn't N2 *28* g/mole since atomic nitrogen has an atomic mass of roughly 14? N2 is *two* atoms in a molecule. Similarly, O2 should be about 32 g/mole.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[Hatta]

You are right, I am wrong. I mistook the atomic number for the atomic weight. Silly mistake.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[j79zlr]

While this may sound funny, but isn't that a lot. While air does have weight how much air is 3 lbs? The area over vermont 10' deep?

If you took an invisible column and surrounded the Eiffel Tower, the air inside that column would weigh more than the steel structure.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[Chris Burke]

I dunno exactly, but I do know that a 1" square column of air from sea level to the upper atmosphere weights about 14 lbs.

Re:3 lbs a day!?

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

3lb is 3lb. You measure amounts of air in units of mass. The pound is a unit of mass. What are you after? One of those comparisons like "every year the ISS loses as much air as the line of peanuts you could make if you drove round the state of Vermont in a VW bug and dropped one peanut every 35 minutes"?

Mike Holmes solution

[Anonymous Coward]

just spray-foam it.

Re:Mike Holmes solution

[Midnight Thunder]

just spray-foam it.

I know that was meant to be a joke, but can't they just spray some dye in the air and see where it goes?

Re:Mike Holmes solution

[tcolberg]

I think the air leak is small enough that any movement of the dye is more likely to be influenced by the movements of the astronauts or the station's life support system. This is even more likely if the leak is hidden behind some plate or components, which seems to be the case if they haven't found the leak with their current detection methods.

Cues

[Bearpaw]

Cue human missions vs automated missions debate.

Cue government space programs vs private space programs debate.

(At least the breathing oxygen vs breathing vacuum debate would be short.)

Technical issues?

[Kjella]

They don't end. From the 60s computer with faulty radio tubes to todays supercomputer-in-a-console, technical problems shows up every time and never mind mechanics with all that wear and tear and partially working stuff rather than "simple" 0s and 1s. We progress by fixing them, then we push the envelope a little further and run into new ones. Seriously, sometimes it sounds like we haven't learned *anything* about space travel since 1969 and that's just not true. The things we can do something about is a lot safer. However, sending something into space still requires the same escape velocity, reentry velocity, it's in a vacuum and unless some fundamental laws of physics change it'll stay that way. I hardly think it's so difficult we should just give up and go home though.

Good they're in Earth orbit ...

[Ihlosi]

... would be worse if they had to learn to deal with these problems in Mars orbit.

Um, it's in space dude

[blackjackshellac]

Things go wrong. Hell, I have a fairly major leak in my den. And my basement leaks a bit too on rainy days. Whatever will we do.

Space is hard

[geekoid]

but to quote some guy:
"We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too." - JFK

http://www.quotesandsayings.com/sjfk.htm

Yeah, it's hard and complex. We will learn how to make maintenance of those systems routine and automated. We will continue to look forward, we must less we stagnate and die. The fate of the Dinosaurs will be our fate as well if we don't diversify off this rock. There are a lot of steps between here and the next habitable planet. Whether it's habitable because nature forms more planets like ours, or habitable because we terrorformed it makes no matter.

Re:Space is hard

[Bat Country]

Tell me more about this... "Terrorforming." Is it.... evil?

Take a cue from Enterprise

[Capella or Bust]

This is no problem. Just seal that sucker up with some mashed potatoes, and everything'll be fine.

hope it's not like my pool

[Anonymous Coward]

My pool had a leak. Very small leak. Pinhole of water. Within 12 hours, it had grown to a significant leak, sized about 1/4 inch round. Trying to fix it, it tore to about 2 inches round. Finally the water dropped below the hole, and it was easier to fix.

Hopefully that small leak doesn't tear open a larger hole.

I wonder if the leak is causing the space station to slowly rotate?

Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[corsec67]

FTA: "a slight air leak of about three pounds (1.3 kilograms) per day".
I hate to break it to this reporter, but on the ISS, a pound is a large number of kilograms, since they are in microgravity. Pound is a unit of weight, and gram is a unit of mass. The conversion between them depends on the gravity that the object is experiencing, which in this case is almost none, so the 1.3 kilograms of air is almost 0 pounds.

Too bad we can't moderate the TLP as "troll".

[mmell]

After all, Columbus, DeGama, Balboa, Cortez, Magellan - they all had flawless journeys of exploration, didn't they?

Full Machine Shop

[sammyo]

There needs to be sufficient tools and supplies that any of these problems can be fixed without sending up a 5 Billion dollar delivery. This would be an ideal spot for a 3D printer, even if it was very expensive. Need a part? Make and customize, 3 hours...

Re:Full Machine Shop

[ShadowMarth]

If only it were that easy. I'm certain that the circuitry necessary wouldn't last very long under those conditions. We have to use extraordinarily outdated computer technology simply to function in the radiation, after all.

End debate

[geekoid]

"Cue human missions vs automated missions debate."
Both.

"Cue government space programs vs private space programs debate."
Government for pushing new boundaries, private for established routine stuff.

"
(At least the breathing oxygen vs breathing vacuum debate would be short.)"
I can't weigh in on this one because I couldn't hear what the guy in vacuum was saying...

Simple fix?

[Radon360]

Send 'em a can of industrial grade great stuff.

(ducks)

Bleeding money

[metrometro]

Anyone know the lift-cost of "three pounds (1.3 kilograms) per day" of air? I know the space station has been hemorrhaging money for years, but it's rarely this, um, poetic.

Mod parent up!

[RingDev]

I was trying to figure out what they meant by that too. Are they losing 3 PSI a day? Or is it just a reporter who doesn't understand the distinction?

-Rick

Re:Mod parent up!

[MichaelSmith]

Thats pounds mass. Gas quantities were measured that way all through the Apollo program.

Re:Mod parent up!

[Anonymous Coward]

By the same people who brought you "seconds" as the unit of Isp... I wonder if the cancel the d's in their derivatives, too...

Dallas - Houston big problem...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's like, when I drive to Dallas to Houston I don't have any problems.

It's actually got a huge problem: Called "I-45"

Movie-inspired salvation

[Lurker2288]

I totally saw this in a movie once. All they need to do is open a prominently featured can of Dr. Pepper and let the soda spraying out through the hull show them where the leak is. Caveat: this plan carries a small risk of vaccuum-freezing Tim Robbins.

Re:Movie-inspired salvation

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't get it. What's the caveat?

Re:Movie-inspired salvation

[caulfield]

At least TR had the good sense to die quickly in that movie. Why wait for the second reel when you can cash your cheque and be off to make "Antitrust" right now?

Let's give up on all research.

[palegray.net]

Quoth the poster: While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately.

Yet another round of bugs were discovered in several major operating systems and userland packages. I'm all for operating systems, user software, and advances in computing technology. but there have been some major issues lately. I vote we give up and go back to the abacus and using smoke signals to communicate.

Re:Let's give up on all research.

[DigitAl56K]

I second that motion! ..slides bead left..

Now we just need.. ..5.. 10.. 15.. 20.. 23..

23 more votes for the motion to pass!

Re:Let's give up on all research.

[Gazzonyx]

Can't we just use apache like the rest of the civilized world?

Re:Let's give up on all research.

[jon287]

I vote we give up and go back to the abacus and using smoke signals to communicate.
Have you ever even tried to look at abacus pr0n?

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

You sir are technically correct. The best kind of correct.

Those are some brave people.

[cadeon]

Man, I don't know if I could sleep knowing that my spacecraft had a leak. What if it gets worse? I sure hope they have some good safeguards against this small leak quickly turning into a decompression.

Re:Those are some brave people.

[drizzx]

And that is why you are on earth and they are not. I think that because space travel/life is so high profile people seem to forget that astronauts & cosmonauts take and accept these risks.

You accept the risks of being killed in a car accident everytime you get inside a car, but does that keep you up at night?

Re:Those are some brave people.

[MichaelSmith]

Man, I don't know if I could sleep knowing that my spacecraft had a leak. What if it gets worse? I sure hope they have some good safeguards against this small leak quickly turning into a decompression.

Well during the apollo program astronauts spent more than seven hours outside in a pressure suit, driving around the countryside as much as 10km away from the LM.

Before going outside they did a leak test on their suits and a loss of less than 0.3 PSI over two minutes was considered acceptable.

This leak is much smaller than that. A typical airliner would leak down to ambient pressure in a couple of minutes without constant pumping of air. That fact isn't the reason I find it hard to sleep on planes.

This is a slow leak (the second in the last couple of years IIRC) and they have plenty of air available to make up the loss. For a while, anyway.

Re:Those are some brave people.

[iamacat]

On the rare occasions I drive at night, yes the thought keeps me awake pretty well.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Gov.Kodos]

It is quite common to convert POUNDS to KILOGRAMS assuming a "1G" environment. So when they talk about "pounds" on the ISS them simply mean the amount of mass that would weigh "1 pound" in 1g (on earth). People just don't go around saying "pound-mass".

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[turgid]

Pound is a unit of weight, and gram is a unit of mass.

My dad, who is from the Olden Days when people used pounds and inches, and an Engineer, says that there exists a "pound-mass" and a "pound-force" and the reader is expected to have the wit, depending on context, to distinguish between them.

Nobody is really concerned?

[ROMRIX]

"Nobody is really concerned about this," Madison said.

That is so untrue! We are all concerned with this issue and will do all we possibly can to, huh, where? OMG PONIES!

Even More Informative!!

[JLDohm]

According to the ever reliable Wikipedia, a pound is defined to be 453.59237 grams (pound(mass)), OR 4.4482216152605 newtons (pound(force)).
We'll give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that the ISS isn't completely devoid of air.

Minor Leak

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think I'd consider any leak minor, especially if I were on board...

Isnt there a simple solution like...

[Ancient_Hacker]

Isnt there a simple solution like...:

• Have someone light up one of those nasty Russian cigarettes while somebody outside looks for puffs of smoke.
• If the hole is actually about 2m in estimated size, something about the consistency of pancake syrup should plug it quite nicely. A fine aerosol of Aunt Jemima in the general area should get sucked into the hole within an hour or so. Cleaning up the rest is left as an exercise to the occupants.

Re:Isnt there a simple solution like...

[Zibblsnrt]

If the hole was about 2m in estimated size, I don't think finding it would be much of a problem...

Space Construction is Hard

[RedHat Rocky]

Space Construction is Hard. Space Maintenance is Hard as well.

Now, I sit in an office where the temp goes from 72 to 80 in the space of 30 minutes and it sounds like dead bodies are flapping around in the air ducts. It stinks and the only cockroaches I've seen are the dead ones, as the live ones have plenty of hiding places.

And you're complaining about some minor air leaks and a computer problem or two on a Space Station?

PLEASE!!

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Detritus]

It's about 0.1 slugs of air per day, or 6.6 stone per fortnight. Are you happy now?

OT, thread hijack- Evel Knievel dead at age 69

[Anonymous Coward]

A great American daredevil icon, who was capturing the hearts of Americans during the same time NASA Apollo programs were going strong in the 1970's, Robert "Evel" Knievel has died this afternoon at age 69. God rest his soul. What does this have to do with the ISS? Not much except I grew up in the 70's with both the space program and EK influencing my childhood.

As a motorcycle-riding, space program loving geek, I'll jump a curb or something in his honor on my ride home from work, and raise a glass to his memory this evening.

Re:OT, thread hijack- Evel Knievel dead at age 69

[Radical Moderate]

"What does this have to do with the ISS? Not much "

Like the astronauts, Knievel put his life on the line in the pursuit of.....what? Fame and glory certainly, but when you come right down to it going to the moon, or building a condo in orbit, makes about as much sense as jumping over the fountains at Cesar's. There's no concrete benefit(yeah, I know, comsats, etc. but you don't need manned space travel for those), but it's cool to know that we did it.

when will it end... never

[confused one]

It's not like we've done this before. This is the first time we've assembled something this complex in orbit. Even if building space stations was routine, there would be technical glitches that turn up and need to be dealt with. What you are seeing is all part of the learning experience.

Minor Leak?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when is an air leak in space "minor"?

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Chilled_Fuser]

Um. Pound implies force per square inch (PSI), not mass times acceleration.

  When your air gauge indicates 30 pounds inflation on your car tire, you haven't added 30 pounds of weight.

Tinfoil hat on

[Leuf]

If part of the station is losing 3 lbs per day but the whole system appears to be stable, then the real question is 3 lbs per day of what are the aliens injecting into the station?

failure is not an option?

[sohp]

Seriously, the story of the space program is not "we did so well nothing went wrong" but, "when things went wrong we used our guts and brains and fixed them"

Examples:

Gemini 8 thruster stuck. Armstrong was able to regain control and return safely home.
Apollo 11 landing 1201 and 1202 program alarms. Programmers on the ground and flight engineers were able to rapidly determine that the alarms posed no threat and the landing continued to success.
Apollo 13. Catastrophic explosion disabled the service module. The astronauts returned home safely using the LEM as a lifeboat and some creative navigation.
Skylab launch: Ripped off a solar panel and part of the outer skin. Astronauts were able to rig a replacement screen to cool inside of the lab and open the other solar panel that was stuck partly open. Three expeditions extended the time in space records and recorded what was then the most detail solar observations ever.
STS-49: Multiple attempts to capture and return an Intelsat satellite failed, but a final attempt involving the shuttle commander flying directly to the satellite and it being hand-captured by 3 spacewalkers succeeded.

There are plenty more, including the recent working solving problems with stuck and torn solar panels.

Incidentally, these kinds of things are why I favor human spaceflight over robots for complex and difficult challenges.

Re:failure is not an option?

[filterban]

The Mars rover Spirit had a glitch. JPL very nearly lost Spirit because they filled up all of the space on the flash memory. This was recovered because a software engineer thought ahead of time to include a backdoor to boot it into a recovery mode with no file system. There are countless examples on this project where good design ahead of time made for a very successful project.

Spirit and Opportunity are great examples of robots doing wonderful things in space. Landing on Mars and driving around is a very complex task. And it goes to show that NASA and JPL employ some really smart people and these people can make stuff that does great things.

With robots, you only risk the money and time you've invested. With human spaceflight, you end up with a much greater problem - a Columbia or a Challenger type disaster where you not only lose the money invested but also the priceless value of human life.

Re:failure is not an option?

[caluml]

Apollo 13. Catastrophic explosion disabled the service module. The astronauts returned home safely using the LEM as a lifeboat and some creative navigation. Skylab launch: Ripped off a solar panel and part of the outer skin. Astronauts were able to rig a replacement screen to cool inside of the lab and open the other solar panel that was stuck partly open. Three expeditions extended the time in space records and recorded what was then the most detail solar observations ever. Wow, that sounds exciting! Someone should make a film about that! :)

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Detritus]

Correction, that should be 3 stone per fortnight.

Not a major issue.

[Anonymous Coward]

The article dosen't specify the leak as being a 3psi loss, so if we're talking just 3lbs, that is exceptionally minor. The Shuttle Orbiters leak like sieves probably about on par to 3lbs per day with their irregular pressure hulls, and in the connecting articulations to a spacehab installation or the payload bay mounted airlock configuration. No biggie.

You could fly a almost perfectly airtight pressure hull but it would weigh considerably more than a pressure hull that retains 99.8% of the atmosphere, and is less than half the weight.

Obligatory

[eclectro]

So in other words, in space nobody can hear the hiss?

Re:Obligatory

[clem]

I have had it with these motherfuckin' snakes on this motherfuckin' space station!

Re:Obligatory

[eclectro]

That's not what I heard;

I have had it with these motherfuckin' solar panels on this motherfuckin' space station!

"Ultransonic Leak Detector"?

[Greyfox]

Stupid NASA. All they have to do is submerge the space station in water and pressurize it to 10 atmospheres. That'll find that leak in NO TIME!

Leak Tracking

[p0tat03]

Isn't there a fairly simple way to track down leaks? Just set a very light but very visible object in the room, and watch as it naturally drifts towards where the air is exiting the vehicle. It will at least give you a small area to look, as opposed to hunting everywhere within a module.

Re:Leak Tracking

[achenaar]

Just set a very light but very visible object in the room
Perhaps an inanimate carbon rod...?

Re:Leak Tracking

[agengr]

You would have to let go of said object in such a way as to cause *no* disturbance. Easier said than done. The station is also deaccelerating at the rate of 1/1000g due to atmospheric drag, so leaving any object not fixed to a bulkhead will cause it to drift over time.

Re:Leak Tracking

[Zibblsnrt]

They're losing a kilo of air per day; that's about twelve milligrams a second, which is a really, really small amount. A pen cap weighs about eighty times that. The movement in air currents that that would cause would be entirely cancelled out by the currents whenever a crew member turned his head, never mind normal movement to and fro.

If they could locate a leak by taking an object and waiting for it to get sucked towards the hole, chances are the hole would be simple to find in the first place.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

Um. No.

If you were loosing 3 psi per day, I think you'd get a might uncomfortable.

Minor air leak?

[mveloso]

In space, I'm not sure you can characterize an air leak as 'minor.' If I was up there, I'd be spending pretty much all of my time trying to find and seal it.

Minor would be something like itchy underwear.

Re:Minor air leak?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Mercury capsule's cabin wasn't even completely airtight. If they didn't wear their spacesuits and relied only on scrubbers they wouldn't last very long.
Besides, worse come worse they could seal off the new module IIRC.

Now we now,

[Anonymous Coward]

why astronauts drive cross-country in diapers!

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Jay L]

Look, accuracy is nice, but you don't have to go the whole 8.2 meters with it.

You'd better keep waiting...

[Jugalator]

While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? When will a space station under development be free of problems?
When will a software in development be bug free?

This is technology, technology even in a quite extreme environment... I think you'd better get used to it. I think this is part of space science.

As long as we can handle it, we can handle it. I don't think we can hope for more, really.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[kmac06]

The force of gravity is still about 90% at the ISS altitude compared to the surface.

Idiot OP?

[dotancohen]

While this is yet another technical issue with the ISS, when will this end? I am all for the space program, but there have been some major issues lately. Are you kidding? Do you not have any idea how fucking complex and unique the ISS is? My 2008 Ford Focus has gone in for repairs three times in the four months that I've owned it, and Ford has been building those motherfuckers for over 100 years now. The ISS is the third of it's kind, designed and built from scratch and completely hand made. In space! By people wearing spacesuits! You don't expect a problem every now and then?!? I'd go so far as to say that problems are the major mission of the ISS. The creation and solving of problems is building experience for NASA, the Russians, the Europeans, and everybody else involved. Not to mention those brave guys up there actually manning the thing. Problems or not, the ISS is one hell of an achievement. The fact that it hasn't killed anybody yet is either a miracle or testimony to the amazing engineering that has been invested in it.

Re:Idiot OP?

[JoeGee]

I don't agree with idiot OP, it's always been in /.'s nature for the blurb to contain some conversation-stimulating point, but you're spot on regarding the invaluable experience we're gaining due to the ISS. Learning something totally new will always be trial and error. That's the nature of learning. Without these errors the procedures, techniques, and materials will not be in place thirty or fifty years from now when we've finally (hopefully) reached the point where we want to create permanent research colonies, or even settlements, on other worlds.

If today's risk-averse attitudes had been prevalent in the Europe of the mid 1400's today's Europeans might very well be speaking Quechua or Mandarin, living on reservations, and the "New World" would be Europe and Africa. As it is I look for the safety-conscious, risk-retarded US of A to roll over on its back and belly-up by the end of the century to some place like the Peoples' Republic of China. Today's US only has cojones when polls show the majority of its people are united behind some silly-assed, slick-packaged, simplistic concept.

-Joe

Re:Idiot OP?

[Blakey Rat]

My 2008 Ford Focus has gone in for repairs three times in the four months that I've owned it, and Ford has been building those motherfuckers for over 100 years now.

Yeah, the Focus model is badly in need of a refresh.

Re:Idiot OP?

[ispeters]

I agree with you completely and find your vitriol to be hilarious. Do you think your post says more about Ford or NASA?

Thanks for the laugh

Ian

Re:Idiot OP?

[dotancohen]

This is my sixth Ford: I've gone through a '69 Mustang, '72 Mustang, '84 T-bird, '88 Turbocoupe, and an '88 Continental before this Focus. I've also worked as a service tech at a Ford dealer for a few months. Ford is an amazing company, and each time they renew themselves they do it right. Until I work my way up to a BMW, I'll be sticking with Fords. For the interested: the 351W from the '69 Mustang was all I left of the car after wrecking it. When I blew up the 2.3 turbo in the Turbocoupe I replaced it with the 351W. Did all the work myself: it's one of my favorite projects to this day. As the front of the Turbocoupe was smashed, I replaced it with the bumpercover of a '92 Mustang. 375HP, 5-speed '88 Thunderstang.

Re:Idiot OP?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is my sixth Ford:

You must be a real masochist. I understand that some people like pain, but for the love of god, stop doing that to yourself. There are good cars available.

Not to mention, the T5 is kind of undersized for that engine. I'd have broken it in half in the first week. Yikes. Nice job putting it together though. I'm looking to combine a W123 diesel Mercedes with a Dodge Dakota - sort of a pre-Daimler-Chrysler thing.

Retreat!

[Anonymous Coward]

When will it end - no kidding! We should withdraw the astronauts to Okinawa and let them do Zero G research on trampolines.

Space is exploration, you dolts !

[speedlaw]

Wow. I guess the first few airplanes that didn't work, the subs which sank, killing all (frequently), and the first attempts at radio communication which also did'nt work are all bad ideas. What next....a safe trip up Everest ? Get a grip...this is cutting edge, learning to work in space. If we don't get off this planet, we will become extinct here, either due to drowning in our own pollutants or a nuclear temper tantrum. Stop subsidizing oil companies and Archer Daniel Midland, and spend the money for things like space...and maybe education or health care.

The poster has a lot of misleading information...

[jnadke]

Looks like trolls are posting articles now. Sooner or later they'll learn to read and write, maybe even think.

I calculate* the leak as being 0.22mm in diameter. Incredibly small leak.

For reference, this is approximately 2 times the diameter of a human hair (~100 um).

The wonders of science...

*Proof: I'd imagine the space station is pressurized to 1 atm. Given that 1.3 kg of air leaks out a day, and the density of air at 1 atm is 1.225 kg/m^3, this means the volumetric flow rate is 1.15741 E-5 m^3 per second (assume the space station is so big, the leaking air doesn't change the pressure). To solve for the area of the leak A = flow rate / velocity, we need velocity. Velocity can be calculated as sqrt(pressure differential / density). The pressure differential is 1atm = 101,325 Pascals (1 Pa = 1 kg/m/s^2).

Plug it all through and you get an area of 4.024E-8 m^2 for the size of the leak. Assuming it's circular, diameter = 2 * sqrt(Area/pi) = 2.253E-4 meters.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the gravity on the ISS is about 90% of the gravity on the surface of the Earth.

They know where the leak is

[Anonymous Coward]

But the investigators are questioning all of Bush's top advisors to make sure they didn't know about it first.

Hold up a sec..."Possible Leak"

[iamlucky13]

Did no one read the article? It says they're investigating a possible leak. They haven't even confirmed it isn't a miscalibration or some other spurious data.

For comparison, there's about 400 kg of free air inside the space station, and the purported 1.3 kg per day leak isn't even enough to show up as a pressure drop.

I checked NASA's ISS site, and there doesn't seem to be any mention of a leak there yet. The latest update does mention leak checks between the brand new Harmony module and the shuttle docking adapter which was moved to Harmony's forward port but has not yet had the Harmony-side hatch opened. Presumably the purported leak is related to these checks, but that isn't clear.

Re:Hold up a sec..."Possible Leak"

[mikael]

If there was an air leak, wouldn't the water vapor condense and form ice around the venting region (like a little volcano?)

ISS = Experimental

[Nim82]

The whole manned space program is still experimental, it's purpose is to push the limits of our capabilities and expose problems/weaknesses so they can be overcome. Sooner or later were going to need to step off this rock and expand out, ISS is valuable stepping stone and research tool on that path.

You can only simulate so much in the labs, practical experience is what counts. Finding and fixing leaks, whilst annoying (and I dare-say worrying to those onboard), will provide a lot of valuable data, vital for future long duration space-flight missions. Better to learn these things in Earth orbit where they are 'just' a Soyuz drop away from home, than in a Martian orbit... months out.

Space Treaty killed space exploration

[Anonymous Coward]

The Space treaty we (and most others) signed that said we couldn't own parts of space killed off space exploration.

In your analogy to the Spanish, the entire point of their explorations was to gain wealth and territory. Columbus didn't go out to find a New World. He went to find a shorter route to Asia. (BTW, everyone thought the world was round. Everyone from the ancient Greeks onwards knew the circumference of the world. Chris thought they were wrong and that the world was smaller than it is. He was wrong, but there happened to be 2 continents out in that big sea.)

Same with the Persians, Romans and even the British, they went out not for "science" but to get wealthy. Be that wealth territory, trade, or slaves.

We signed a treaty saying that we couldn't have any of those things. The US can't have a moon base, because the treaty says we can't. Cost ain't the only reason it is an INTERNATIONAL space station.

We killed off the incentive for exploration and then we bitch about how no one does exploration.

Repeal the treaty and we will colonize the Moon and Mars. If for no other reason then you turn those items into part of a land grab and put the US, EU, PRC in competition. But no one is going to spend trillions of dollars on something they aren't allowed to own. We took all the prizes out of the race and are surprised that no one is really running.
Or amend the treaty so that we can own the land, but not the void.

Once that treaty got signed NASA stopped being about exploration and started to be come a white-collar welfare program for "science".
BTW, NASA was also about showing the world how good our ICBMs were.

Re:Space Treaty killed space exploration

[afidel]

I don't disagree with you completely, but there was a very good reason to stop the ownership of space at the time those treaties were signed, it was to stop a new arms race. Space is the ultimate high ground and no sane person wanted to see the militarization of space because that's what's needed to hold onto to ownership, force.

Not to worry....

[Radical Moderate]

Once the air level drops below the hole, they'll fix it no problem.

It's a minor leak, but it's very expensive air

[Phat_Tony]

At $20,000 per pound to deliver more air with the space shuttle, it's very expensive air their losing, at $60,000 worth of air per day. How long would it take to leak a minor scientific research project out of the budget?

Re:It's a minor leak, but it's very expensive air

[Bane1998]

I'm guessing that's a figure based on dividing the total cost of a trip into space into the various parts that get launched. If we have to send up more air in a hurry, I'm sure that cost could easilly grow, and not linearly.

Re:It's a minor leak, but it's very expensive air

[wxjones]

Let me clue you in. There really is no scientific research on the ISS. All of NASA's research is done by robots or unmanned probes. The manned space program is simply the advertising department for NASA.

Re:It's a minor leak, but it's very expensive air

[proudfoot]

That's cost amortized. To add an extra 40kg worth of cargo to an existing launch is probably much less then that.

Some exageration...

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Apollo 11 landing 1201 and 1202 program alarms. Programmers on the ground and flight engineers were able to rapidly determine that the alarms posed no threat and the landing continued to success.

Not to nitpick, but to claim that this is an example of "when things went wrong we used our guts and brains and fixed them" kinda demeans the rest of the list. This is something that seemed to be a problem, but was not.

There are a lot of things that required brains and guts to fix them (although in many cases, the astronauts on board were somewhat committed, so I would say more nerves than guts.)

Re:Some exageration...

[Ellis D. Tripp]

In that case, the brains and guts were needed to make the call not to abort the landing...

Re:Some exageration...

[Actually, I do RTFA]

In that case, the brains and guts were needed to make the call not to abort the landing...

Abort the landing, and... die in space? Seriously, your committed to try to get back, even if you don't think it will work.

Re:Some exageration...

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Sorry to respond to my own comment, but I meant "you're" not "your".

Re:Some exageration...

[Ellis D. Tripp]

No, the option was to abort the landing, redock with the CSM, and return to earth.

Yes, it would have sucked, but it would have been a hell of a lot better option than crashing into the moon (which might have been the outcome if the 1201 and 1202 alarms were actually serious problems).

Re:Some exageration...

[sohp]

No, they wouldn't die. Apollo LM abort mode at that point would have been something like what they did with Apollo 10, which was the test mission before. Separate from the descent stage and use the ascent stage to return the crew to the CSM.

As noted, the guts and brains part comes into play in knowing when things go a little wrong they are still "go" to proceed.

A similar kind of thing happened during the Apollo 12 launch when the vehicle was struck by lighting -- twice. Lots of alarms and a few minutes of concern, but flight controllers and astronauts working together were able to recover and continue a successful second lunar landing.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[baadger]

By its strict scientific definition, the Kilogram is a measure of mass not weight. Therefore the force of gravity is irrelevant.

/. Glory Troll

[Nethemas the Great]

Give me a break man, you're nothing but a troll looking for your 20 minutes of fame on /. Your arguments couldn't be more sensationalized or forced. The guys down at NASA, their contractors as well as the rest of the international partners are doing one hell of a job for the absolute peanuts they're being funded with. The US spends as much per day on their middle east campaigns as those guys get funded in an entire year.

Slight correction:

[Kiyooka]

"Minor leak in the ISS Being Investigated" actually says what the subby is trying to say...

Minor Leak Being Investigated Aboard the ISS suggests they're investigating from space, which would be cool too I guess...

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, the calculations for gravity at that point say otherwise:
Values:
G = Newton's Gravitational constant [ 6.67428 x 10^(-11) N*m^2*kg^(-2) ]
m1 = Mass of Earth ( 5.9736×10^24 kg )
m2 = Mass of ISS ( 2.32693 x 10^5 kg)
r_e = Radius of earth ( 6.371 x 10^6 m )
r_i = Radius of earth and ISS ( 6.731 x 10^6 m )

Equations:
F = Gm1m2/r^2

F_e = Gm1m2/ (r_e)^2 = 2.28564*10^6 N
F_i = Gm1m2/ (r_i)^2 = 2.04769*10^6 N

So, in fact, there is only a 10.4105% difference in the force of gravitational attraction (give or take reasonable error). The real reason why the feeling of weightlessness occurs is Newton's simple law:
F_net = Weight - N = ma
You'll notice that weight could be substituted for mg, where g is the acceleration due to gravity. Also, because there is little atmosphere, one can say that F_net = mg -N = mg, where a is equal to g. Thus, since the ISS is effectively in "free fall," no perceivable net force is exerted on the falling mass, as the force that we perceive as weight is actually the normal force, which must be zero in this case. Of course, the physics is more complicated if you wish to be more precise, but you get the point.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[mrjah]

What do you think the P in PSI is for? "Pound" MOST CERTAINLY implies mass times acceleration.

Your air gauge is indicating a pressure of 30 pounds per square inch, not 30 pounds. If you're talking about pressure, you'd only say "30 pounds" if you're just simplifying the phrase "pounds per square inch" to save your tongue some work. You ought to just say PSI instead.

"Pound" also can be used as a shortcut for saying "pound-mass," or the amount of mass that would weigh one pound on Earth. In the Apollo days this was quite common, and I'm sure the lingo lives on to some degree in the design offices at NASA. My older engineering professors would refer to "pounds-mass" all the time, whereas the younger ones exclusively used kilograms or (occasionally) slugs.

So "pounds" can be used informally to refer to either mass, mass times acceleration (i.e. force), OR mass times acceleration divided by area (i.e. pressure). But used in its true form, a pound is a unit of force.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[mrjah]

You mean 8.2296 meters.

ISS is leaking minors?

[CrimsonScythe]

Minor Leak Being Investigated Aboard the ISS

I had no idea they let minors aboard the space station, let alone enough of them to sustain a leak. I wonder if their parents know where they are... Won't anybody think of the children? Besides the guys investigating the leak, i mean. Well, at least it's not leaking miners. (Sorry, Galaxy Quest, for that shameless rip.)

In other news...

[SonicSpike]

Scientists have found Uranus rings gaseous

Seriously?

[cybersavior]

Of course there's gonna be problems. Imagine if in the 1400's the entire would could see in real time every splintered mast, frayed rope, broken rudder, or lost anchor on columbus' voyage. Expect this kind of stuff in the exploration of a region un-mastered by man.

Re:Pound != 0.454 Kilogram on the ISS

[thsths]

> I hate to break it to this reporter, but on the ISS, a pound is a large number of kilograms,

I hate to break the news to you, but on the ISS, even a kilogram is not a kilogram heavy :-)

Well, all I can say is ...

[ScrewMaster]

once they find that leaker, they should shut him up for good. Nobody likes a whistleblower.

Ground control to Major Tom:

[Lost Penguin]

You're circuits dead, there's something wrong.

Memory leak

[Bigon]

Am I the only one who read memory leak?

KERMIt

[ThatsNotPudding]

KERMIt, a "Kit for External Repair of Module Impacts", is one of those simple systems being developed at Marshall Research to seal punctures in the ISS. It will enable crewmembers to seal punctures from outside damaged modules that have lost atmospheric pressure. Delivery of the kit is scheduled for next year. KERMIt is also useful for sealing leaking atmospheric seals as TFF article describes (more info here).

It ain't easy bein' green - IN SPACE!

oh no !!!

[Anonymous Coward]

a leak is going to let all the space in !!

Thank you, Charlie Epps....

[Chris Brewer]

Seriously, this is one of the reasons I love coming to /. :)

You're not "all for" the space program...

[NateTech]

If you're worried about a minor air leak and posting questions that hide your real agenda to Slashdot.

Re: Station inside balloon

[Anonymous Coward]

I really like that idea. But instead of one balloon there should be several inside one another. Pressure could drop from inside to outside giving all balloons some structual integrity from the pressure while not putting too much pressure on it. Also if one baloon fails you have backups.

A huge problem though are meteroide impacts. They would surely punch through the balloon(s) leaving (a series of) holes at entry and exit points. The bigger the balloon the more likely a hit is. Care would have to be taken that the balloon does not rip or explode (ever stuck a needle into a balloon?) when punktured or you would get massive explosive decompression and anyone caught outside a pressurised module would be dead. You do want astronauts to work without cumberson spacesuites inside the ballon, right? But that is a problem the existing inflatable prototypes have solved or are woring on anyway.

On second thought a spherical baloon might not be the best design. How about an icosahedron? You would ship up identical triangular pices of membrane, combine them to bigger triangular shapes and then to an icosahedron. The joints on the big triangular shapes would have to be different than the ones inside them. So you have actually 3 pices. Corner triangles, side triangles and inner triangles.

But here is the good part. You build a small shell first, put in some emergency shelter and life support in the middle (or the ISS). Then you build the next shell(s) around it slightly bigger. Then, when you want to expand, you dismantle the inner shell, add a few more triangle membranes and reassemble it at the outermost shell.

Another bonus is that you could put solar pannels on the membranes. They would need to be semitransparent to filter some sunlight anyway.

Now what to do with all that space inside? Just letting things float around is probably a bad idea. Heavy things could pick up a lot of momentum and kill anyone trapped between two colliding pieces. So for the greenhouse bring up some more, by now totaly standardised and mass produced, triangle membranes and build a small icosahedron. Fixate it with some cables against drifft, add some gas exchangers instead of some modules (pump O2 out and CO2 in) and some shelfs for the plants.

Now, where is Joe Millionair for pay for it?

Anonymous coward.