Object Near Space Station Said No Threat
Posted on: Monday, 16 June 2003, 06:00 CDT
A tiny object seen drifting near the international space station most likely was just an identification tag from an external power or data cable, and it poses no threat, NASA officials say.
Astronaut Ed Lu saw the object drift past a window Thursday, and ground crews e-mailed pictures of possible matches to him for identification.
From those pictures, Lu said the object resembled one of the many 2 1/2-inch-long metal tags attached to cables on the exterior of the space station, agency spokesman Kyle Herring told the Houston Chronicle.
The tags are secured to the cables with fiberglass cord. Engineers are not certain how the tag came free.
Herring said NASA's sensitivity to breakaway objects has been raised by the Feb. 1 breakup of shuttle Columbia, but the loss of the tag is not considered a safety hazard or an operational problem.
The leading suspect for causing the damage that led to Columbia's breakup is a piece of foam insulation that peeled away from the shuttle's external tank during the Jan. 16 launch.
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