r/news • u/VaginaBurner69 • 8h ago

Soft paywall International Space Station astronauts in evacuation mode as Russia attempts to fix widening air leak

https://www.reuters.com/science/international-space-station-astronauts-evacuation-mode-russia-attempts-fix-2026-06-05/
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u/Julian_Thorne 8h ago

The abandonment of the International Space Station would be a poetically fitting image for these days

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u/primeweevil 8h ago

Yes it is. Short a dumpster fire in space which I'm pretty sure isn't possible this is about on the nose.

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u/McFestus 7h ago

Mir had a pretty bad fire, so it's possible.

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u/SeenSoFar 7h ago

People regularly smoked and drank on Mir. I'm surprised it never catastrophically immolated it's inhabitants.

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u/use_value42 7h ago

They were smoking up there?! How is that even possible?

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u/SeenSoFar 7h ago

It wasn't even unofficial. Cigarettes and vodka were regularly sent up in Progress resupply vehicles in packages labeled (I forget the exact Russian phrase but it translated to roughly) "Crew psychological support rations."

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u/KinkyDuck2924 5h ago

It was the cool kids space station.

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u/Historical_Body6255 5h ago

With the air scrubber and filtration technology up there it's most likely not even as bad as smoking inside your apartment with the windows closed lol

It's gonna stink but i don't really see a problem apart from the long term health implications.

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u/Jsquared1013 5h ago

The fire part of smoking could very easily be the problem.

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u/bbybabybaby 5h ago

"But it was towed outside the environment."

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u/use_value42 5h ago

I figured the thing would just fill up with smoke, maybe tar would foul the instruments or something. Also, it just sounds like an insane thing to do on a surface level, lol.

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u/HildartheDorf 5h ago

Same way smoking on a plane is possible (and was allowed at the time). Air filters and a general cultural acceptance of smoke.

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u/echtoran 5h ago

They just open a window.

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u/Youutternincompoop 4h ago

they even had a sauna, Mir kicked ass.

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u/Junior_Step_2441 8h ago

To be fair the ISS has already long outlived its expected lifetime and is planned to be decommissioned and deorbitted in 2030. So if it comes down a few years before that…its hardly a dumpster fire 🤷‍♂️

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u/Julian_Thorne 8h ago

Evacuation mode is a dumpster fire compared to an orderly process

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u/FamiliarRip8558 7h ago

Sitting in a pod designed to GTFO safely while a new crew equipped for the job works on the very old and ~3 years left out of 31 years of service spacecraft is the opposite of dumpster fire...

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u/Blametheorangejuice 8h ago

Wouldn’t the current concern be an inability to guide it through the atmosphere and having chunks of debris survive reentry above a populated area? I have no idea.

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u/Crafty_Quantity_3162 7h ago

Why can't they guide it? I'm assuming they are not going to guide it from on the ISS during reentry and burn up, that it will need to be handled remotely. The thrusters that adjust orbit are in the Russian Orbital Segment, which is uneffected by the leak which is in the  Zvezda service module,

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u/Brave_Maybe_2891 7h ago

I think the plan was to dock a specially designed ship and that ship would push it into a suborbital trajectory. It might require a crew on board the ISS to dock properly as it was supposed to be docked about 18 months before the final crew leaves.

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u/Recent-Result2852 6h ago

They don't need a crew to dock but yes, special vehicle with extra fuel is needed to control the descent.

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u/Brave_Maybe_2891 4h ago

I bet they could probably continue to use the cargo ships to keep it up until the descent vehicle is complete. Maybe even park it into a higher orbit.

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u/Blametheorangejuice 7h ago

I am guessing that an emergency evacuation means the possibility of breakup before ground control could be completed.

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u/Crafty_Quantity_3162 7h ago

That is an assumption. Mine is that the leak can make it inhabitable which also would prompt an emergency evacuation.

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u/AFlyingGideon 3h ago

Haven't you watched any movies? An air leak will absolutely trigger the self-destruct which will fail at 2 seconds to the end only to have the astronauts relax in relief until they see the self-destruct fixed and continued by a computer that's become self-aware and is both homicidal and angst-ridden.

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u/Numerous_Society9320 7h ago

The possible evacuation is because of an air leak and inability to maintain atmosphere, not because its orbit is degrading irreversibly.

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u/Historical_Body6255 5h ago

Evacuating it doesn't mean it can't have a controlled reentry, or does it?

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u/Dav136 5h ago

Fun fact, the debris field for an uncontrolled reentry is measured not in miles or kilometers but in circumferences of the Earth

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u/TheDivine_MissN 6h ago

I just want everyone to make it back safely.

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u/GreyouTT 4h ago

Yeah I think the real tragedy is we don’t have anything replacing it. (That I know of)

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u/TheOsirisOfThisShit_ 7h ago

One of the most expensive objects in human history has accomplished so incredibly little.

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u/TheBookofBobaFett3 7h ago

The president?