NASA has narrowed the source of an elusive leak on the space station to 2 Russian modules ...

[left-of-center2012]

... one of which provides crucial life support.

The International Space Station has been leaking for more than a year. While the station is perpetually losing some air, officials first noticed an increase in that airflow last September. At the time the leak wasn't major, but this summer they saw an uptick in that already higher-than-usual rate.

So in late August (2020), the three crew members aboard the station — the NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and the Roscosmos cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner — hunkered down in one module of the station and sealed off the others. After closing the hatches, they conducted leak tests on each section. But their data didn't reveal leaks in those sections.

That leaves only two modules that could be leaking: the ones the crew didn't test because they were inside them while monitoring the rest of the station. One is the Zvezda Service Module, which provides life support for the station's Russian side. The other is the Poisk Mini-Research Module 2, which serves as a port for docking spaceships and a place where crew members prepare for spacewalks. "With the crew living and working in these modules, it was impossible to achieve the proper environmental conditions necessary for this test," said NASA spokesman, Daniel Huot.

NASA and Roscosmos, Russia's space agency, are working to identify a "window of opportunity" to test those remaining modules for leaks, he added — either by finding a way for crew members to safely isolate the untested modules or by using specialized detectors that wouldn't require sealing the sections off. In the meantime, Huot said, "the crew is in no danger and the space station has ample consumables onboard to manage and maintain the nominal environment." Consumables, in this case, refers to breathable air.

https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-narrows-source-of-leak-on-space-station-2-areas-2020-9

[Silent3]

1. Gee, how come the don't just dip the entire space station in a giant tub...

...of water, and look for where the bubbles come out?

[PJMcK]

2. Why do all roads lead to Russia? (n/t)

[Blue_true]

4. Heck, where is a good bathtub in space when you need one?

Seriously, given that Space is a vacuum and the leak is from high pressure, that is going to be a doozy of a leak check problem. They could try putting a colored gas around the points that have to highest probability of leaking (fittings and conduits), but they would need really fast cameras because once that gas is in a high vacuum, it gone almost instantly.

[Blue_true]

3. Oh well, I guess a big assed bottle of Leak-Bubble will be rocketed up to them.

I hope that they find the leak before filling space with bubbles.

[Brother Buzz]

5. Hey Ridley, got any Beemans?

[Silent3]

8. +1 n/t

[ogsball]

6. Netflix Away . . . spoiler (sort of)

The talk about this in the last episode of Netflix's series Away.

I've enjoyed the series, which tracks an international space mission to Mars.

[Takket]

7. wrap the walls in duct tape. you'll catch it eventually

lol

[Baclava]

9. That thing is really old, core was sent up in 1998. Its future is uncertain past 2024 for us.

The Chinese are supposed to launch their space station in 2022. Then they will have the high ground, look out.