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Space Station Crew Prepare For Emergency Spacewalk
astroengine writes "After the discovery of an ammonia coolant leak supplying one of the solar arrays on Thursday (video), International Space Station managers have decided to plan for an unscheduled spacewalk on Saturday to repair the problem. The final decision about whether to go ahead with the extravehicular activity will be made late on Friday. 'Good Morning, Earth! Big change in plans, spacewalk tomorrow, Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn are getting suits and airlock ready. Cool!', tweeted the Space Station's Expedition 35 Commander, Chris Hadfield, on hearing the news an emergency EVA may be required of his crew. 'The whole team is ticking like clockwork, readying for tomorrow. I am so proud to be Commander of this crew. Such great, capable, fun people.'"
Yeah he'd have an "ammonia leak" in his pants.....
You can't have regular solar panels; you need ammonia-cooled solar panels. You can't simply walk out and fix it, there's no air. You can't use a wrench, because conservation of momentum means you rotate around the bolt. And after all that and you fix it, a piece of junk from a Chinese satellite killer takes you and your new solar panel out.
This is why we're still whizzing around in LEO. Imagine doing this crap 100 million miles away when you can't "just" get more ammonia if you really needed it.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Just pop the radiator cap and drop in a raw egg; that'll stop the leak. For awhile. But hurry up and dump this lemon on an unsuspecting buyer, quick.
Just a moment...just a moment...I've just picked up a fault in the AE-35 ammonia distribution unit. It's going to go a hundred percent failure within 72 hours.
The point is, in an emergency there is no checklist
Hey Anonymous Coward, there sure as hell is. The whole point of a checklist is you remain calm and 'work the problem.'
If you're in the cockpit of a 747 and the engines flame out at 35K feet the first thing you do is grab your checklist.