14 DAY TRIAL // One of the high-tech toilets aboard the International Space Station (ISS) suffered a malfunction earlier this week, and a NASA astronauts was tasked to repairing it on Wednesday, July 13. Fixing the commode has several implications for the delicate recycling systems aboard the station.
For all their training and years of practice, astronauts can at times be asked to perform some of the most mundane chores, such as cleaning potties. NASA mission controllers suspected that air bubbles had clogged the toilet's pipes, and astronaut Ron Garan was tasked with investigating the issue.
The Expedition 28 crew member, who had just completed a maintenance extravehicular activity (EVA) outside the orbital lab yesterday, swapped his spacesuit for plumbing tools, and then got to fixing the zero-gravity, $90 million device.
According to mission logs, the first signs of trouble were literally sniffed out earlier this week by the 10 astronauts currently on the ISS. Six of them are part of Expedition 28, while the other four make up space shuttle Atlantis crew for her final voyage to space.
“That's the great thing about spaceflight. One day you're outside spacewalking, doing the most outrageous things the humans have ever done. The next day you're fixing toilets and unpacking boxes,” Garan's EVA partner, ISS astronaut Mike Fossum, explains.
The joint crew is working hard towards unpacking the 9,500 pounds (4,300 kilograms) of cargo that the orbiter brought to low-Earth orbit (LEO) inside the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) Rafaello.
The payload includes a year's worth of spare parts, scientific experiments, food, propellant, water and personal items for the Expedition 28 crew. “It's all in the life of an astronaut,” NASA lead ISS flight director Chris Edelen told reporters yesterday.
Given their complexity, the toilets aboard the station require constant maintenance. Some of their components need to be changed as often as once per month, while others need to be changed or maintained on intervals ranging form 70 days to one and a half years, Space reports.
“We want to be good hosts and have a toilet there that works. We even invited the shuttle crew members to use it if they need to,” Edelen added. The troublesome toilet is now fully operational.
Atlantis will remain attached to the ISS until next week. The orbiter's 13-day mission, called STS-135, will conclude on July 21, when the shuttle will land at the NASA Kennedy Space Center (KSC), in Florida.