In several interviews, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said he had reason to believe that Roscosmos hadn’t been informed, noting that “they’re probably just as appalled as we are.”Īlthough this demonstration came as a surprise, it isn’t the first time that anti-satellite weapons tests have produced dangerous debris in orbit.
knows for certain that the resulting fragments, in terms of test time and orbital parameters, did not and will not pose a threat to orbital stations, spacecraft and space activities.”Īt this point, it’s not clear whether Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, knew about the test in advance. The Russian defense ministry has since released a statement confirming the test but denying any risk to the space station: “The U.S. “The things rumbling around my mind are: Why now? What is this tied to? What message are they trying to send? And why that specific satellite?” she says. The test shredded a satellite whose orbit intersects with the path of the ISS, putting the humans on board, including Russian cosmonauts, at risk. “Even though we know they have this capability, we were shocked that they chose to test it as they did,” says Kaitlyn Johnson, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. The impact left behind hundreds of thousands of debris objects that now pose a risk to the ISS crew and other satellites in low-Earth orbit (LEO). State Department later confirmed that the debris endangering the space station was produced when Russia tested an anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon and intentionally destroyed one of its own defunct satellites. “It’s a crazy way to start a mission,” mission control told the crew during a briefing.
NASA has since canceled a handful of planned activities, warning that the schedule would be in flux. They stayed inside these orbital lifeboats for about two hours, then repeated the exercise roughly 90 minutes later, as the station again passed through the new debris cloud. The station was about to pass through a freshly created cloud of orbital debris that posed a significant risk to the seven space travelers on board.įour NASA astronauts, who had arrived just last week retreated, to their SpaceX Dragon capsule, while Russia’s two cosmonauts and another NASA astronaut took cover in their Soyuz spacecraft. Early on November 15 astronauts aboard the International Space Station received an unexpected directive: Seek shelter in your docked spacecraft in case of a catastrophic collision.