A US-built orientation engine has failed aboard the International Space Station, leaving it uncontrollable and drifting, Russian media reported Thursday.Note the emphasis on nationalities. We're still a bunch of unco-ordinated factions, not an International team. And while certain antedeluvian attitudes and management practices persist - in all factions - the situation isn't going to change for the better.
An undisclosed source at the Russian Mission Control Center told the ITAR-TASS news agency one of the U.S. gyrodynes, which provide precise orientation for the station, stalled Wednesday because of an incorrect command from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Russian controllers urgently switched on engines of the Russian segment of the ISS to return the station to its proper position, and orientation control was restored with the use of the U.S. gyrodynes within 5 1/2 hours, the source said, although more than 30 pounds of fuel were expended during the unplanned maneuver.
Intermittent postings from Canberra, Australia on Software Development, Space, Politics, and Interesting URLs.
And of course, Brains...
Pages
▼
Tuesday, 15 February 2005
Still a few bugs in the system
More evidence that the ISS (International Space Station) is fulfilling a vital role in testing International Co-operation in space. From SpaceDaily :
No comments:
Post a Comment
Anonymous commenters - please add a signature (doesn't have to be your real name) on each post of yours. Anne O'Namus, Norm D. Ploom, Angry from Kent, Demosthenes, or even your real initials, it doesn't matter.
Commenters are expected to be polite to each other, but the same standard doesn't apply to comments regarding me.
Australian commenters are very very strongly advised to publish anonymously. Sydney alone has more defamation actions than the entire USA and UK. Nearly double that of the UK in fact.
As Google does not reliably inform me that a comment has been posted, and I have no control over first publication, I assert that all comments are innocently disseminated under the NSW DEFAMATION ACT 2005 - SECT 32 and similar acts.