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Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

usatoday.com

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Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#61

Post by jmbwell »

kurthr wrote: post #11
sonicanatidae wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They usually are. I suspect this was a missed step by someone.

There's a giant swimming pool in Galveston which has a full underwater replica of the ISS for astronaut training. There are other scuba divers that work with the astronauts when they practice maintenance. One of their jobs (like the invisible waiter at a high end restaurant that makes dirty utensils go away) is to "retrieve" anything that the astronauts "put down". Often the maintenance jobs are multi-hour "space wal…

There's one in Galveston in addition to the Neutral Buoyancy Lab at JSC in Clear Lake?

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#62

Post by jacquesm »

RetpolineDrama wrote: post #47
Mizza wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a copypasta floating around - badum tish - giving an account of a particular US astronaut - https://futurism.com/the-byte/russia-threatens-nasa-astronau... - who caused this and a lot of other major problems. Accusations of misinformation, yada yada yada, but it sounds like it might have been a case of the roommate from hell, only in space. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vXdRUIZ_EM whoops

For a highly trained astronaut that "oops" in the video seemed extremely careless.

Highly trained astronaut doesn't mean much.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_Nowak

Nobody's perfect and nobody is infallible and that includes highly trained astronauts. Short of this being done on purpose (hard to believe to begin with) I'd just chalk it up to an accident.

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#63

Post by KyleBerezin »

"That tool bag, valued at $100,000, circled the planet for months until meeting its fiery end after plunging to Earth and disintegrating. Experts believe last week's missing tool bag will share the same fate as it hurtles in the upper atmosphere, which has become increasingly littered."

That makes no sense. Its like they are saying it burning up will 'litter' the upper atmosphere. I assume they meant to say that it being in orbit as debris is the litter, but I'd doubt it will be up there long due to its altitude and density.

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#65

Post by jacquesm »

p1esk wrote: post #15

Tool bag “valued at $100,000”? What could possibly be in there?

Tools that don't seize in a vacuum. Vacuum is a very rough place to work with tools because stuff tends to fuse.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_cementing

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#66

Post by nerdponx »

yieldcrv wrote: post #56

> "The white, satchel-like tool bag slipped away from two astronauts during a rare, all-female spacewalk." Could have left that in drafts

Apparently the howling masses love it when a woman messes up in space. Try to hold your lunch down while reading the comments here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPV9QpC1JtU

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#67

Post by kube-system »

ericbarrett wrote: post #60
munk-a wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably just regular stuff but of a high enough quality that we'd consider sending it to space? Defense and space equipment procurement is usually a lot more expensive than normal because 1) companies exploit the bidding system 2) you really don't want a screw driver that fails when you're re-attaching a solar panel to something floating in LEO since the run to the local Lowe's is going to be quite expensive.

There's an old "just so" story that still pops up from time to time about how US astronauts found that normal ball point pens don't work without gravity, so NASA spent $bignum to have a contractor develop a "space pen." But the Russians used a pencil! Haha, look at these inefficient US government programs! Except it turns out that (a) the US did originally use pencils; and (b) the last things you want floating around…

And also, NASA did not pay Fisher to develop the pen, he already did.

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#68

Post by Phrenzy »

Smoosh wrote: post #58
I_Am_Nous wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love 10mm wrenches so much I bought a Japanese motorcycle :P I do so much better with whole numbers than fractions.

As well as the 10mm wrench, you may find it useful to have a 1cm spanner.

Or a metric Crescent wrench.

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#69

Post by hotpotamus »

sundvor wrote: post #45
hotpotamus wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you've ever worked on a modern car, you'd know the importance of the 10mm wrench. Maybe they had some Toyota guys consult on the ISS.

Context, possibly: https://youtu.be/2jlxO6s5N6Q?si=7iled4EV7nWWyb-A

Hadn't seen that one, but it is a bit of a meme. I'm not joking about working on cars though - my 2001 Toyota Corolla was full of 10mm bolts, and I have on occasion needed to pick one up from the hardware store only to find an empty spot between the 9mm and 11mm sockets.

Re: Astronauts drop tool bag into orbit that you can see with binoculars

#70

Post by aaron695 »

sieste wrote: post #25
fouronnes3 wrote: post #3

Anyone got a link to an official report detailing what happened? The article is kinda light on details, but I assume this is a major mishap that can only happen if multiple things go wrong simultaneously? Everything m they do up there is a precisely choreographed dance so it would be interesting to read a technical report on that.

Yes it's a bit light on details. But they do point out the most important facts, namely what gender the astronauts are and that it has not been officially confirmed whether the tool box contained a 10mm wrench. Personally, that's everything I needed to know about the situation.

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