Water
from recycled astronaut urine is riding the space shuttle Discovery back to
Earth after the successful test of a vital urine processor aboard the
International Space Station this week.
Astronauts
were expecting to pack about four or five liters of water samples from the
station's urine recycler aboard Discovery before the shuttle's
Wednesday departure from the orbiting laboratory so they can be returned to
Earth for analysis before the system can be declared
fit for human consumption.
"I'm
looking forward to drinking it and finding out how it tastes," said
Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata said in a televised interview this week.
Wakata is Japan's first long-term station resident and will be aboard the
station when the system may be ready.
The
water samples taken today were siphoned from the station's potable water tap
and other parts from its larger water recycling system after astronauts repaired
a urine processor that broke down last December. In addition to recycling
urine, the system collects astronaut sweat, wastewater and condensation from
the station's atmosphere to recycle back into pure water for drinking, bathing
and oxygen generation.
NASA
wants to make sure the recycled water is ready to support the station's planned
jump to six-person crews — double the current size — for the long term.
"We
had great success with the operation of the urine processor assembly,"
station flight director Kwatsi Alibaruho told reporters from Houston this week.
The
station's urine recycler began distilling astronaut urine back into pure water
late Sunday night for the first time since it broke just weeks after being
installed in late November.
Engineers
tracked the glitch to a
centrifuge-like distillation assembly, which spins to begin filtering pure
water from waste. Discovery astronauts delivered a replacement for that
180-pound (81-kg), which the spaceflyers installed and tested over the weekend
to apparent success. The new part did not make any of the loud noise and
vibrations associated with its broken counterpart, the astronauts said.
"It's
amazing to watch," station commander Michael Fincke radioed Mission
Control during the test. "This bodes very well. This feels very, very
smooth."
Discovery's
seven-astronaut crew is in the homestretch of a 13-day mission to deliver
Wakata and the last pair of U.S. solar arrays to the space station. Returning
home aboard Discovery is NASA astronaut Sandra Magnus, whom Wakata replaced, as
she completes a 4-1/2-month mission at the station.
The
shuttle is also bringing about five months' worth of blood and other biological
samples from station experiments to waiting scientists on Earth.
The
astronauts will undock from the orbiting laboratory Wednesday afternoon and are
due to land Saturday.
SPACE.com
is providing continuous coverage of Discovery's STS-119 mission to the space
station, with reporter Clara Moskowitz at Cape Canaveral and senior editor
Tariq Malik in New York. Click
here for mission updates and SPACE.com's live NASA TV video feed.
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