This calendar week , lotus-eater were able to look up in the sky and see something a little different from the usual constellation : a bag ofastronauttools .
harmonise toUnited Press International , astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O’Hara were on a quad manner of walking outside the International Space Station ( ISS ) in early November when their shaft outfit manage to get aside from them . The bag is enjoin to contain highly specialized tools used for sustainment .
It ’s really visible from Earth , provided you have a telescope or a reasonably good pair of binoculars . Just calculate for a whitened satchel . The broody surface of the bag is such that it ’s closely viewable even without enlargement . Because it was dropped near the ISS , those curious need topinpointthe positioning of the station . The bag — known as a crew lock bag — will be floating closely by .
Losing one ’s traveling bag on distance tool is not a new phenomenon . In 2008 , astronaut Heide Stefanshyn - Piper was repairing a jammed gear on the ISS when a cup of tea get away from her .
As human race continue their journeying into space , there ’s been maturate concern that debris from their travels could finally prompt a terrestrial accident . In 2022 , aNature Astronomypapercalculatedthat the odds of someone being killed by spent rocket parts could be as much as 10 percent in the next 10 years .
There ’s also the not - insignificantissueof a piece of debris nick a foreign military satellite , prompting mix-up over whether it was an fortuity or an intentional attack .
No one should occupy about a space screwdriver settle from area , however . Experts believe the grip and its content will disintegrate in the Earth ’s atmosphere sometime in March .
In a blog Emily Price Post , NASAwrote that Moghbeli and O’Harawere“replacing one of the 12 truckle bed bearing assemblies on the port solar alpha rotary joint , which allow the arrays to track the Sun and mother electricity to power the place . ” The job was still able to be complete .
[ h / tUnited Press International ]
