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Russian Cosmonauts Conduct Spacewalk to Investigate ISS Hole

At the end of August, the International Space Station experienced the first major incident since its creation: a small hole in the Soyuz MS-09 capsule attached to the station was found to be causing an oxygen leak. Now, nearly four months after the incident, people went outside the ISS to have a look at the said hole.
Soyuz MS-09 hole seen from the outside 1 photo
Photo: NASA TV via space.com
Initially, the spacewalk was programmed to take place in November but was postponed following the botched launch of the Soyuz MS-10 capsule in October. On December 11, two Russian cosmonauts finally suited up and exited the ISS.

The two, flight engineers Oleg Kononenko and Sergey Prokopyev, spent no less than seven hours on this extravehicular activity, inspecting the damaged area and then going in to get a sample.

The operation was not simple, as the two men had to cut at the layers on insulation covering the damaged section of the Soyuz. Once all obstacles were removed, Oleg Kononenko was able to collect some residue from the rather large hole they discovered.

The samples collected will be analyzed to shed light on one of ISS’ largest mysteries, one because of which Russia started pointing fingers at the U.S. and the Soyuz builders for intentionally having made the whole.

Initially, the Russians said that the hole was either made on Earth, during the assembly of the capsule or even in space, by the Americans. Both theories stated at first the whole was made on purpose, but that rhetoric watered down eventually and the Russians are now waiting for official results of the analysis.

After the hole was discovered, Sergey Prokopyev used epoxy on a gauze wipe to plug it. It currently remains in the same state as before, but it is not endangering the lives of the astronauts.

The Soyuz MS-09 will not be used to bring people back from the ISS, but is to be filled with trash and destroyed by the Earth’s atmosphere during reentry.
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About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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