NASA says the crew aboard the ISS has sufficient supplies and will not be affected by the delay.
(Mirror Daily, United States) – NASA made an official statement in which it confirmed that black mold delayed the ISS resupply mission. For the moment, the agency is still working on identifying the cause of the black mold, but the evidence they have so far points to the high levels of humidity in Florida.
The black mold was found on the packing bags that were supposed to be sent to the Space Station. The journey of the supplies was not a regular one, but it also marked the fifth resupply mission that used the Orbital ATK.
Dan Hout, NASA’s official spokesperson declared that the delay will not be longer than two weeks. According to Hout, the agency wants to make sure that all of the black mold is removed and the entire equipment disinfected before sending the craft to the Space Station.
NASA wants to make sure that all of the traces of mold are removed from the equipment because the fungi can endanger the health of the astronauts that are currently on the Space Station. The agency also wants to make sure that the problem will not appear again.
The Space Agency should keep the spores as they mark the first time in the history of NASA when they had to deal with this kind of infestation. It is also the first time in the history of the agency when they were forced to unload cargo in order for a transporter to be disinfected. But at least, the circumstances are extraordinary.
Even though the delay is of only two weeks, the NASA official has no idea at this point how much this incident affected the SpaceX scheduled cargo resupply run.
SpaceX will take care of the resupply missions in the next years. Elon Musk’s company declared that the collaboration with NASA is running smoothly and they haven’t encountered any problem. It’s safe to assume that the mold infestation cannot be considered a major problem in the collaboration of the two agencies.
NASA has declared that black mold delayed the ISS resupply mission for approximately two weeks. The agency added the fact that the astronauts that are currently serving on the Space Station will not be affected by this delay because they still have sufficient supplies.
Who knows, if they’ve seen Matt Damon’s The Martian maybe they’ll think about growing potatoes on the ISS to make their supplies last longer. The agency should really consider adding some seeds in their next shipment.
Image source: www.pixabay.com
Ryan Harris
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