Space Station Computer Failure Tilts NASA Mission

By Traci Watson

The Russian computers on the International Space Station have suffered a massive failure that, if not fixed, could require the crew to abandon the orbital laboratory, a NASA official said Wednesday.

Space shuttle Atlantis, now docked to the station, is helping make up for the most important system that went offline because of the computer crash. NASA managers are discussing whether to extend Atlantis’ visit by one day to allow more recovery time for the computers.

If the computers are not running by the time the shuttle has to leave, the three-person station crew "can always leave," said Michael Suffredini, NASA’s station manager. "Whether we’d leave the (station), I don’t know. … We have the option to depart."

Suffredini said he expected the computers to be running smoothly again by the time Atlantis needs to depart. If the station residents had to leave, they would ride in a Russian space pod.

The station has had at least two human residents since late 2000. NASA has never come close to yanking the crew off the station, not even when the food supply was running low in late 2004.

The computers have many roles, but their most crucial function is to control the firing of Russian jets that help keep the station in its correct orientation. The computer crash means that the station has only one orientation system, a set of U.S. devices called gyroscopes.

The gyroscopes are too weak to keep the station pointed in the right direction during some events, such as the departure of a space shuttle.

Orientation of the station is important because it determines whether portions of the station get too hot or cold and whether the solar panels can produce enough power.

"Clearly we need to get (the computers) up and running" before the shuttle leaves, Suffredini said.

The station is in no immediate peril because, if the gyroscopes shut down, the shuttle’s steering jets can control the orientation of the linked shuttle-station system.

Atlantis can stay docked with the station only until Tuesday before running out of fuel, shuttle official John Shannon said. The shuttle arrived Sunday night.

Never before have the computers all failed at once without rebooting themselves and coming to life again, Suffredini said. He said he suspects that something in the environment caused the failure, because neither the hardware nor the software changed recently.

Roughly half the rooms that now make up the station are operated by Russia and half by the United States. Each side has its own systems for producing oxygen, measuring air quality and other functions. The U.S. side does not have its own ability to control orientation except for the gyroscopes. The Russian orientation jets are used for big maneuvers, such as when the station needs to swing around suddenly to avoid space junk.

Atlantis has its own problems. During launch, a heat-protection blanket near the shuttle’s tail became unstitched, which could lead to damage of the shuttle as it re-enters the Earth’s atmosphere. Shuttle managers decided Wednesday that the blanket would be tamped down during a spacewalk Friday.

The problems threatened to overshadow the construction work being done on the station during Atlantis’ visit. Earlier Wednesday, two shuttle crewmembers on a spacewalk helped retract some balky solar panels that need to be folded for new solar panels delivered by Atlantis to work properly.